Company Profile
Deluxe Productions is a San Francisco based wholesale manufacturer of skateboard gear and clothing. Started in a garage by two guys whole love skateboarding, the company continues to set new trends in the skateboarding marketplace. Many competitors have laughed at their efforts and then disappeared while the company has grown to lead the skateboarding business in innovation and success.
The Challenge
As a wholesale manufacturing company, Deluxe does not sell product to retail customers. They have a network of distributors who push the product into the retail market. The company advertises to create brand awareness, not direct sales. Their website is used to promote their brands and the professional skateboarders they sponsor. It provides information on where to purchase products, run contests and show videos of skateboarding. They also run a message board to give other skateboarders an online forum to communicate with Deluxe and each other.
For years, Deluxe has collected email addresses for their newsletters. When collecting email addresses, they had no way to determine the names and identity of each email address owner in their list. As the email addresses on the list began to age, Deluxe had no way of managing expired email addresses, bounces or other changes from their subscribers. Another problem that came up was proving they had legal permission to send email to their list. With Can-Spam laws stiffening, they had to find a way to clean and update their list.
The Solution
Deluxe turned to Digital Mail Maker to manage their list. The addresses were uploaded to the system and a give-away contest was prepared to run on the Deluxe website (www.dlxsf.com). The contest was announced on the home page of their site along with an email sent to their list. To enter the contest, the entrants were asked to provide name, home address, sex, age range, answer a few questions about which Deluxe products they favor, and the magazines and websites they read to keep up with skate boarding.
Using Digital Mail Makers advanced campaign, the entry form to the contest was connected to the database of email addresses. As Deluxe’s website visitors and email recipients entered the required information, it was matched to existing email addresses or added as new members of the list.
The Results
Today Deluxe enjoys the security of a list with a complete listing of how and when their email addresses where gathered. Nearly every person has given permission for accepting email communications and offered demographic information about them selves. The company only uses this list for email newsletters and event promotions. Should they choose, they have a valuable resource of data that could be used by their distributors for targeted and personalized direct marketing in both email and print media.
