Small businesses are missing opportunities to market to customers and track results, according to a survey by Pitney Bowes Inc. of 750 of its customers.
“A surprising number of businesses are not tracking results of communications they send to customers and prospects, particularly through direct mail and email,” said Justin Amendola, a digital strategy executive with Stamford-based Pitney Bowes, in a written statement. “This is a big missed opportunity for businesses who could instead help their business grow by using any of a number of affordable, easy-to-use communications tools to deliver and measure their marketing programs.”
Pitney Bowes found that 73 percent of respondents do not measure their email marketing metrics, while 80 percent fail to measure their direct mail or traditional mail metrics. Small businesses also rely heavily on traditional channels for customer communications and may be missing opportunities to use newer tactics such as social media, Pitney Bowes stated.
Email is the most used channel, with 46 percent of respondents using it as their primary channel for business communications, followed by phone (22 percent) and direct mail (11 percent).
Of businesses with between 50 and 100 employees, none listed social media as their primary channel. Those businesses that did list social media as their primary channel tended to be companies with 10 or fewer employees.
While email is the top communications channel for small businesses, many still aren’t taking full advantage of it for marketing purposes. Respondents”™ primary reason for using email was for basic correspondence related to ongoing business (59 percent); however, the number using email for sales and marketing is still fairly low.
