Earlier today, I wrote my buddy, Ty Glasgow, President of BigBad, an email with a simple question, "What's your position on PURLs?" Thought others might like to see his very thoughtful response.
"PURLs have shown they can yield effective results when made part of a direct mail campaign and the company is looking to increase purchase rates by enough of a percentage to make a difference to the bottom line. From what I have read in the past few years this seems to have impact when we are talking about 1000's, and in most cases, tens of 1000's of orders where a small percentage increase can mean a lot in terms of total dollars sold of widgets.
The more successful use of PURLs occurs when incorporated into a larger integrated strategy as opposed to a discrete activity. While there are many success stories within 'industry' in general, I believe most marketing teams don't realize the effort it will take to do effectively, and will not integrate it into their overall strategy.
PURLs work best when they carry through the concept. For example, a postcard arrives with a PURL. The person goes to the site, then what? That experience needs to be personalized and not just have the persons name attached like the online equivalent of a mail merge letter. Thus, this needs to tie into the CRM in some way both for tracking and for personalization. Someone like Amazon can do this because its part of a bigger CRM system and they are tracking my buying and browsing habits (of course this then extends into super personalization territory).
In higher education, we have seen some colleges use PURLs over the past years. I would question the effectiveness in general based on the trite factor and lack of authenticity the person will feel once they go to the PURL and generally find it's what anyone would get, just with their name added. However, if the school can personalize that experience perhaps it can be effective, especially if the experience becomes even more personalized based on interactions the user has with the site."
Wise thoughts from the master.
Click here to follow me on Twitter
Leave a comment