It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change. | ||
| --Charles Darwin | ||
We live in a world where our mere survival is based on our ability not only to invent but also to continuously reinvent ourselves as we find new and better ways to adapt to the world around us. Electricity, the telephone, the printing press—all are life-changing inventions that enabled our society to modify the way we experienced living. These inventions enabled us to reinvent the manner in which we approached each element of our daily rituals. Without a continuous stream of inventions, the human race cannot continue to evolve.
There have been many life-altering inventions during the past 200 years. Many of us have been fortunate enough to live during times of great invention and change rather than simply reading about them in a history book. Beginning with the first Internet experiments in the early 1970s, we were witness to one of the world's great evolutions in communications: the invention of email, an electronic mode of immediate conversation. Since that time, this communication vehicle has become a necessity, adopted by the mainstream population. JupiterResearch forecasts and data indicate that 88 percent of the U.S. online population uses some form of electronic communication, which equates to 77 million people in the United States using this new invention. That's a staggering number, because it represents three-quarters of the total households in the United States. And while email has been a driver of communication change, it has also reinvented the way we market and advertise to consumers. No longer do we rely on a one-way message push with a hope for engagement. We are not constrained to guessing about the relevancy and impact our mass message has. Email as a marketing tool has opened up a world of possibilities by enabling a two-way dialogue, personalized messaging, and data-driven analysis. This channel has grown to $1.2 billion in 2007 and is expected to continue to swell to $2.1 billion in 2012.
Recent statistics report that 60 percent of consumers admit they have made immediate purchases from email marketing messages. In 2008, the same reports concluded that 44 percent of consumers stated email marketing messages drove online purchases in the past year and 41 percent reported the same for offline purchases.
The message is clear. This new invention called email is a powerful personal and business tool. It's one that will live in the same life-altering invention ranks as the telephone. Understanding how to harness and direct email as a marketing vehicle is critical to every business in any industry. This book will get you started down that path.
To understand this craft called email marketing, I direct you to the two most highly regarded of its evangelists and experts, Jeanniey Mullen and David Daniels. Jeanniey and David not only theorize about email's role in our world, but they also apply their efforts to re-create successes that power insights and drive growth. I can say this to you firsthand, because I experience these successes daily through the marketing and advertising message employed by Jeanniey and her team at my companies VIVmag and Zinio. I assure you, email marketing is no small feat, yet Jeanniey and David make it look simple and fun.
As you read this book, you will be immediately drawn into the world of email marketing through Jeanniey and David's wit and charm. Their personalities come shining through, even as they discuss and educate you on the smallest details of the trade. This book speaks to the specifics of email marketing, but it opens your mind to a greater manner of viewing relationships with the consumer.
It is with great pleasure that I write this foreword. I hope you find this book as invigorating, enlightening, and enjoyable as I did.
Very best,
David Gilmour
Chairman, VIVmag
Chairman, Zinio
Canadian-born David Gilmour has enjoyed phenomenal success throughout his entrepreneurial career. In 1969, Gilmour and long-time partner Peter Munk founded the South Pacific Hotel Corporation (SPHC), which quickly became the largest hotel chain in the South Pacific. A decade later, the chain was sold, and the partners formed Barrick Gold Corporation, now the most profitable and largest gold-mining firm in the world. They followed this by forming a real estate company called Horsham Corporation, which became TrizecHahn and today is one of the largest publicly traded REIT companies in North America. Gilmour is also the founder of FIJI Water LLC, which in 2004 was the fastest-growing premium beverage in the United States, when he divested himself of the company.
In 1990, Gilmour and his wife, Jill, also opened the Wakaya Club, an exclusive resort on Wakaya Island, Fiji. In 2006, Gilmour founded VIV Publishing LLC, whose first product is an entirely new concept in women's magazines—a health and lifestyle publication called VIV distributed exclusively in digital form.
Gilmour was presented with the U.S. State Department's 2004 Award for Corporate Excellence (ACE) by Secretary of State Colin Powell in recognition of the international growth and success of FIJI Water together with its philanthropic endeavors in Fiji. Gilmour was also awarded "The Order of Fiji" by the president of Fiji, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, in 1998 for his commercial and philanthropic achievements in the Fiji Islands.