Success Story #2

Girls Learn to Ride

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Constant Contact Customer Since: 2002
List size: 10,000
Open rate: 36%
Favorite feature: Interest Categories
Website: www.girlslearntoride.com

Constant Contact customer Girls Learn to Ride offers snowboarding, skateboarding, and surfing clinics (just to name a few) for women and girls of all ages. Founded by owner, Mark Sperling, Girls Learn to Ride (GLTR) was born out of a frustrating snowboard lesson between Mark and his then-girlfriend. He talked to friends who were having the same experience—the girls wanted to learn, but were in need of a neutral instructor. Now, seven years later, GLTR holds more than 150 clinics and camps throughout the United States each year and has annual revenues of $500,000.

All this activity means that Mark has a large, ever-growing customer base, and email marketing is the number one way he stays in touch with them. Three years ago, Mark did his homework on the email marketing services available. He chose Constant Contact because it was affordable and easy to use. He is more than pleased with the results.

"We've done radio, TV, direct mail, and national ads, including full-page ads in Teen Vogue and YM, but, by far, Constant Contact has had better results every time. We track all of our participants, and have found that more than 53% of them found out about us through the Internet or our email newsletter. Email marketing is only a fraction of the cost of print ads. It brings in a phenomenal ROI."

In order to send his customers information that is relevant to them and their interests, Mark segments his list into groups based on age, region, and sport. He collects this information when an individual joins the list through his website or when they register for a clinic or camp. Segmenting his list allows Mark to easily and effectively communicate with each group.

"The Interest Categories feature is great because we can select either a certain region or a particular sport to send an email to. It also helps us determine where we should have events. We look at how many girls we have in a particular region and decide whether or not to have an event there."

In addition to sending out announcements about upcoming events, Mark also sends an email newsletter that goes out to his entire list. The newsletter directs readers back to the website, which recently had a change in format. Now, in addition to highlighting upcoming GLTR events, it serves as an online magazine with information that his core audience, young women ages 14 - 25, is interested in.

"The newsletter offers teasers about info on the website. They can click on a link to find out about their sport and upcoming events, but we also include links to articles about music, popular female athletes, health and other areas of interest."

Mark also sends out last minute reminders to fill clinics that have low enrollment numbers.

"We send out the email and, 'boom!', the event is sold out. Last week we sent out a snowboarding announcement in New Jersey and within the next two days, 60 people signed up."

Mark's list started at 250 a little over three years ago and is currently 10,000 strong. He grows it by asking event participants for their information, but he also gets a large amount of sign-ups through his website and referrals. Some of his more creative initiatives have also gotten a great response.

"One way we get sign-ups is through a monthly contest we run on the website. Visitors who join our email list are entered to win snowboards, tickets, the chance to meet bands and other great prizes. Also, we give prizes to active members who forward the newsletter to their friends and get them to sign up."

The effort Mark puts into knowing his audience and sending them relevant information helps him to keep a solid open rate of 36%. And every open is an opportunity for GLTR to teach another girl to ride.

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Success Story #1

Fajita Grill

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Constant Contact Customer Since: 2005
List size: 950
Open rate: 50.4%
Favorite feature: Website Sign-Up Box
Website: www.fajitagrill.com

In Oswego, New York, Constant Contact customer Fajita Grill is satisfying the taste buds of thousands of people looking for fresh, top-quality southwestern food. Founded by co-owners, Josh Molinari and Anthony Green, The Fajita Grill serves its food "assembly-line" style so the customer gets to choose they want-and there is plenty to choose from. Their slogan is "Fresh food. Fast." For the convenience of their customers, they also offer free WI-FI.

Molinari and Green used to talk about opening a restaurant that served fresh food and had great customer service when they were students at Rochester Institute of Technology. They opened their first store in Syracuse just over a year ago and then a second store in Josh's hometown of Oswego, a few months later. They have future growth plans for adding two more Fajita Grills this summer and they are looking to make franchise opportunities available.

One of the main ways they have been spreading the word about their new restaurant is through email marketing. Fajita Grill's Marketing Director, Abby Weaver, searched the Internet for email marketing services that would fit their needs. "During my research, I read information on Constant Contact's site about how they help get emails through firewalls. That, along with the 60-day free trial, were the clinchers for me in signing up for the service."

When Abby starting using Constant Contact, she had an email list of 480 emails, and now, after just five month her list is up to 950. "I doubled my subscriber list by sending out interesting emails that people would want to forward to friends, having a sign-up form on my website, and putting info about the emails on the LED sign at the restaurant. Even the employees are excited about it! They're telling customers and helping grow the list too."

Abby tried traditional marketing to get more people through the door, but found better results using Constant Contact to send out a monthly coupon.

"I can't believe the number of people who are actually walking in our restaurants and redeeming the coupons. Before I tried email, I put a coupon in the local newspaper and had fewer than 10 people redeem it. Then, I put the same coupon in an email and sent it to 400 people and saw 100 of the email coupons redeemed that month! That's an outstanding rate, given that only 400 were sent. I've also tried direct mail and got such a low redemption rate that I won't do it again. The email coupons are being printed and brought in daily and people are fighting to get on my email subscription list."

Abby loves how easy it is to create and send campaigns. "I don't need a designer. I don't have to wait for a printer or the US Postal Service to get it delivered. I can hit send at 10 am and watch how many people open it, and where they click on my site. It's amazing! And I can do it all on my laptop."

With email marketing, the Fajita Grill will continue to spread the word about their fast and fresh southwestern food to more and more customers in New York and, if they have their way, other parts of the United States. Now that's a business that's sizzling!

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