Finding a Partner
Prior to implementing your private label, you will have to go through the due diligence of choosing the email marketing solution that is right for your business. You will want to find a partner that has experience in the private label business in order to get up and running quickly without encountering any unexpected issues. You will also want to find a partner that is flexible enough to fit its solution into your business model and scalable enough to handle the needs of your different customers.
You should talk to and survey your customers to find out what their exact needs are. Ask them about their current processes and find out the following information:
- Do they already have an email marketing solution in place or are they looking to outsource their solution?
- Are they currently sending out email newsletters, product alerts, and corporate announcements?
- Are they capturing subscribers through an online form on their website?
- Do they track the results of each campaign?
- What are their current volumes and expected growth rate?
- What tools are they using to solve deliverability issues?
- What goals do they wish to accomplish with email marketing?
- What percentage of their direct marketing budget do they expect to spend on email marketing?
- Would they prefer to create, send, track, and manage the email campaigns themselves, or would they like you to do it for them on an ‘as needed’ basis?
Knowing this information prior to selecting a vendor will help you choose the solution that will meet the needs of your customers and it will help you determine what level of service you will need to offer in order to be successful.
After you determine what your customers’ needs are, make a list of your own requirements. For example, if you are reselling the product to your customers, will you need sales training? Will you provide product support, or will that be handled by the ESP? Will you need access to the code to make changes to the product or will the ESP make all of the changes for you? Can you rebrand or reprint any of their corporate documentation, such as best practices white papers, user guides, and brochures or will you have to develop your own material? Having a list of your customers’ requirements as well as your own will enable you to quickly shortlist vendors that meet your needs.
Next, you’ll want to talk to other companies that have implemented the vendors’ products as a private labeled solution. Ask them about the integration process and timeline, their return on investment, their customers’ expectations and, their overall results. Find out how they’re using the solution and ask them for best practices and tips. Finally, ask if you can see the product’s front and back end so you can see how the product has been rebranded to fit into their marketing mix. This should help you narrow the list down to one or two vendors. To select your vendor, work closely with them to determine the timeline for implementation, product and sales training, pricing, launch, and ongoing support.
