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There aren't a lot of people saying this, but direct mail marketing is dead. Actually... Direct mail can still earn pretty remarkable returns, especially in certain industries. But, the ROI that direct mail offers has slowly decreased over time while ROI for email marketing continues to grow.

It’s this simple: companies that segment more, convert more.

Let’s talk about email marketing. Before you hit the “back” button in your browser, think about this for a second: of all the strategies businesses use to sell online (search, social, content, display, email), where do you think email marketing stacks up in terms of effectiveness? Towards the bottom? Middle of the pack?

I stopped to get coffee this morning on my drive into town, and watched with fascination as another customer stood and poured packet after packet of sugar into his coffee. He was grabbing two and three at a time, and by my estimate there were 30 or more packets in his medium sized cup by the time he finished several minutes later. He actually requested a spoon to mix the slurry, since the provided plastic stirrers simply bent double.

Email marketing is a relatively low cost, high return on investment way for companies to get their messages to prospective and existing clients. While marketing budgets have been pared in 2009, the percentage of available budgets has increased more for email marketing than for any other promotional tactics.