Cross channel marketing rfp

1

Cross-Channel Marketing

request for ProPosal

signal

Choosing the right cross-channel marketing product isn’t easy. It’s an emerging space without a clear playbook.

Providers in the industry vary greatly in quality and scope of offering.

That’s why we created this sample RFP, consisting entirely of actual questions from real RFPs submitted to Signal.

We hope it helps you in your search for the right cross-channel marketing solution.

Products

Pricing, Implementation, Services and Support

Security, Systems and Data

Company Information

3

ProduCts

text Message MarketingWhy This Matters

The SMS inbox is the only place where you’re guaranteed to get an open.

It’s important to complement an effective email marketing program with targeted and timely text message content. Your customers are more mobile

than ever before and expect your marketing to be mobile-friendly. By cultivating an opt-in list of SMS subscribers, you’ll be better equipped to delight customers with important news, alerts and offers at the times and places they can act on that information.

Make sure your text message marketing provider can send SMS to all the cell carriers that your customers use and that they are experts in the rules and best practices of SMS marketing.

What text messaging aggregator(s) do you work with?

Think of aggregators as your “middlemen” to the major

cellular carriers. As with most things, not all aggregators

are created equal and vary in delivery reliability and

carrier coverage.

Tier 1 aggregators typically have connections to most or

all of the major carriers. Tier 2 or below may not have

connectivity to one or more major carriers.

Are you aggregator agnostic?

This simply means that the company has connections

to multiple aggregators, which significantly

streamlines the process of transferring short codes

from other vendors.

What is your experience with provisioning new short

codes? What support do you provide in handling this

provisioning? Can I use a temporary shared short

code while my new code is being provisioned?

A short code is the “phone number” for your text

message marketing campaigns. It is the number all your

messages will come from and the number people will

text message keywords to (e.g., text WIN to 75309).

Like with your own phone number, you can request a

vanity number or get a randomly assigned one. Unlike

getting a new phone number, short code provisioning

can be a long and complicated process.

It typically takes 8 weeks or more to get a short code

ready for use. It’s important to have a provider that

is intimately familiar with the ins and outs of this

process and that has the relationships to make it as

painless as possible.

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If I choose not to provision my own short code or do

not have an existing code to transfer, do you have

shared short codes available for me to use?

Shared short codes are used by text message

marketing providers to give multiple customers use

of one short code. This reduces your costs, as you

don’t need to provision your own code, but there are

trade-offs to this approach.

Do you support the use of multiple short codes?

If you want to segment your text message marketing

campaigns between different brands, product lines or

campaign types, there can be value in having a short

code for each campaign.

What carriers do you currently support?

You want as many carriers to be supported as

possible to ensure as many of your customers

as possible are eligible to participate in your text

message marketing campaigns. Tier 1 aggregators

offer the widest carrier coverage.

Do you support international messaging?

Which countries?

If you have customers outside of the U.S. and would

like to allow them to participate in your text message

marketing efforts, you need to ensure your provider

can support this.

What message throughput do you support?

How many messages/second can you send?

If you have large lists or simply need to deliver a

large quantity of messages, the speed with which

your provider can send these messages is critical.

Understanding your provider’s throughput gives you

an idea for how long it will take to send messages.

Do you support Mobile Marketing Association and

carrier guidelines? Are you a member of the Mobile

Marketing Association?

The Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) offers

guidelines for text message marketing that all

reputable providers follow. These guidelines generally,

but don’t always, align with policies followed by the

carriers themselves.

It’s critical the provider you work with has an intimate

understanding of these policies to ensure your

campaigns or short codes do not get interrupted or shut

down by carriers.

Does your product support the ability to provide

consumers information by sending a simple text

message in response to a call-to-action, such as

those I include in my marketing materials?

Commonly called autoresponse or info responder

campaigns, appending a text message call to action

to packaging or print materials is an effective way for

consumers to receive information on-the-go (e.g., Text

“INFO” to 12345 for information).

Does your product support timed or drip campaigns

that allow me to schedule messages to be sent in the

future or at certain milestones that I set?

There are many times you want to schedule a message

to be sent at a time in the future that you specify. You

may also want to have certain messages set to send on

a person’s birthday, anniversary or other preset period

after they have opted in.

Make sure your provider can support these scenarios.

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Does your product support the ability to collect

customer feedback via text message? Can I have this

feedback routed via email to my customer support

team, with the response sent back to the customer

via text?

Offering print and in-store calls-to-action to collect

feedback is an easy, effective way to address the

concerns of on-the-go customers.

Does your product support the ability collect

customer data via text message?

Collecting information from customers via text message,

such as contact information like email, demographic

info or product preference, is an effective way to gather

insights from on-the-go consumers.

Does your product have the ability to display text

messages sent in by consumers to a screen/video

display at a live event (conference, sporting event. etc.)?

Often called “text to screen,” the ability to send text

message comments or answers to questions you pose

to a video screen can create an engaging attraction

at live events.

Does your product support QR code creation?

What QR interaction reporting capabilities do you offer?

QR codes can be an effective way to bridge off line

calls-to-action with an online experience.

Does your product offer SMS coupons? If yes, does

this feature allow me to offer unique coupon codes

to recipients? How can provide these coupon codes

to you—CSV and/or API call? Are reports for coupon

distribution and coupon views available?

SMS coupons typically use alphanumeric codes, often

generated from a point-of-sale system, that are included

in text messages and are unique for each recipient.

These are an effective way to close the redemption

loop and track direct marketing ROI.

Does your product create short URLs that can be

embedded into SMS messages and tracked?

Can I create my own custom short URL?

Though short URLs are ubiquitous, having a tool

to shorten URLs integrated by your text message

marketing provider helps you efficiently trim URLs on

the fly and track clicks on links used in your campaigns.

Does your product support sending an initial message

with an incentive for people to sign up to my list?

Can you prevent consumers from unsubscribing and

re-subscribing to exploit this one-time incentive?

Offering stronger initial sign-up incentives helps

drive opt-in behavior, but it’s also important that your

provider has protections in place to prevent abuse of

these offers.

Can I customize the content and sequence of the

messages sent when people opt in or out of my lists,

or when they text STOP or HELP?

Flexible SMS message options provide control to

produce the customer experience you desire and

ensure compliance with MMA and carrier guidelines.

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Can I personalize messages with your product?

Personalized messages, using people’s first/last name,

etc., are proven to increase relevancy, receptiveness

and response over generic messages.

This is typically achieved with tags you in insert in a

message that pulls in the personalized content when

the message is delivered. Commonly called Merge

Tags, make sure your provider offers this feature.

Does your product have Spanish-language support?

Any provider will allow you to use Spanish in the

messages you compose and send. Where this feature

becomes relevant is for “system” messages, like those

that are sent when a consumer texts STOP or HELP.

Since you may not always be able to configure these

messages (some providers won’t let you configure

them). it’s important to make sure these can be offered

in Spanish.

Does your product support the creation of alternative

or alias keywords for use when I want to track the

source of a campaign entry or opt-in? Are there

reports that show text message activity by keyword?

To help you determine which of your marketing

tactics is most effectively supporting your text

message campaigns, it’s useful to be able to create

multiple keywords for a single campaign, where a

unique keyword is used for each marketing action

you want to test.

Can I search the database of text messages sent by

me or my customers in order to help my customer

support team troubleshoot any issues?

Sometimes customers have questions or concerns

about text messages they receive from you and contact

your support team.

Having the ability to search your message database by

phone number, short code or message content makes it

easy to diagnose customer concerns.

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ProduCts eMail Marketing

Why This Matters

Email is the foundation of your digital marketing efforts.

While there are a number of providers that can help you manage the email marketing basics, it’s important you seek out those companies that have a track record of high email deliverability and give you the tools to create hyper-targeted and personalized messages. It’s critical to be able

to cut through the clutter of email inboxes with content that resonates.

Also, many email providers assume you have technical resources at the ready to manage email template creation and other creative development needs. If you don’t have easy access to these resources, make

sure you find a provider that makes it easy for anyone to create and send great-looking emails.

Does your product require me to have an IT resource

to create emails or email templates?

Often, email marketing providers require you to know

code such as HTML or CSS to build the creative

elements of your emails. If you don’t have this

knowledge in-house, then your costs to do email

marketing will rise and your productivity will drop using

these providers.

Are emails shared across campaigns in your product?

In many cases, the emails you create will be useful

in more than one campaign or for more than one list.

Allowing your emails to be shared across campaigns

and lists saves time and fosters messaging

consistency across campaigns.

Can I personalize email messages with your product?

Personalized email messages that use people’s first

and last names are proven to increase relevancy,

receptiveness and response over generic messages.

This is typically achieved with merge tags you in insert

in a message that pulls in the personalized content

when the message is delivered. Make sure your

provider offers this feature.

What type of email delivery tracking and optimization

tools do you provide?

To ensure that your messages reach inboxes and that

your reputation as a sender is maintained, your email

provider should have capabilities to track delivery stats

for your emails and have procedures in place to ensure

strong standing with the email service providers.

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Does your product have a library of email templates to

choose from? If so, how many do you offer and what

are some of the types or styles of these templates?

Storing and re-using email templates saves time and

fosters brand consistency.

Does your product offer support for customizing email

templates? If so, can I create my own HTML templates

and upload them or can I only edit the HTML in the

templates you provide?

The ability to customize email templates, either by

creating your own from scratch or by editing HTML in

existing templates, provides complete design control

and flexibility.

Do you provide repeatable content regions in an email

that I can use to create content features?

Repeatable regions make it easier to write multiple

features for your newsletter (e.g., linking to your last five

blog posts, featured menu items, etc.)

Is it possible to upload and store images for use in my

emails and email templates?

Being able to easily upload images to an email or email

templates, and then have those images stored to a

library for reuse in the future, makes it easy to enhance

your emails with your engaging visuals.

Does your product support the ability to preview

emails as they would look in different email client

inboxes (e.g., Outlook, Gmail, etc.) before sending?

Do you support email previews on email clients from

mobile devices, as well?

Seeing how your email will look in your customers’

inboxes, whether it be on their computer or mobile

phone, will help you troubleshoot any issues with your

email content or design.

Do you run spam filter tests for emails sent from

your product?

Spam filter tests help ensure your emails are reaching

customers’ inboxes by scanning them using every major

spam filter before you send.

Does your product support timed or drip campaigns

that allow me to schedule messages to be sent in the

future or at certain milestones that I set?

There are many times when you will want to schedule a

message to be sent at a specified time in the future. You

may also want to have certain messages set to send on

a person’s birthday, anniversary at a certain time after

they have opted in.

Make sure your provider can support these scenarios.

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ProduCts soCial Media Marketing

Why This Matters

You already have a Facebook page or Twitter account. Make sure you also have the tools to manage social with the precision of your email marketing.

Seek out providers that offer social publishing capabilities that allow you to schedule your social posts at the right time and to centralize all of your social accounts in one place.

Relevancy and targeting aren’t just for email or SMS, either. Make sure your provider gives you the analytics to mine the social graph for the insights you need to make

your social content resonate with your fans and followers.

Can I track which social media sources are most

effective for me when running marketing campaigns

with your product?

You need to understand the ROI of social media.

Make sure your provider can determine, via tools like

trackable URLs, engagement metrics (comments, likes,

shares, re-tweets, etc.) and search metrics, how your

campaigns perform across the various social networks.

Does your product offer social sharing functionality

on landing pages and in emails?

It’s useful to allow your content to be sharable, both in

emails and on landing pages.

Does your product offer the ability to track brand

mentions or other relevant keyword mentions on

social networks?

People are talking about your brand, your competitors

and other topics relevant to your business every

day. Make sure you have the ability to monitor these

conversations to learn more about customer needs and

respond directly to customer questions and concerns.

Can I manage all of my social media accounts/pages

using your product?

It’s common for marketers to have a number of Twitter

accounts Facebook pages to support various aspects of

their social marketing efforts. Make sure your provider

allows you to manage all of these accounts in one place

to help you be more efficient.

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Can I schedule my social posts for a future date or

time using your product?

Timing of your Facebook updates and tweets can have

a big impact on reach and engagement. Make sure your

provider allows you to control when your social posts

are sent.

Does your product identify who my most active fans

or followers are?

Understanding which of your social media fans and

followers are most engaged in conversations with you

can help identify your true influencers, allow you to

reward them with exclusive offers, and ask them to help

spread the word to others.

Does your product allow me to track sentiment in

social media posts?

Determining which social media conversations about

your brand and competitors are favorable and which are

negative gives you the ability to identify key customer

pain points and trend customer satisfaction over time.

Does your product track my most popular social

media posts and display them prominently so I can

better determine what’s working?

You post a lot of content on Twitter and Facebook

and it can be hard to see which posts generate the

most likes, comments and retweets. Make sure your

provider can identify these and show you how to

duplicate your success.

11

ProduCts web Pages

Why These Matter

Web page creation isn’t just for IT anymore.

Web content is critical to support all of your SMS, email and social marketing efforts. Whether it’s a form to add new subscribers, information about your store locations or a valuable

how-to video, you need the flexibility to quickly create on-the-fly web pages.

Make sure your provider offers the ability to create web content without relying on your IT team, and that those web pages always look great on mobile devices.

Does your landing page creator have a drag-and-

drop interface, or do all pages need to fit into

predefined templates?

Ease-of-use contributes to greater efficiency and

increased productivity. Make sure your provider has a

commitment to making complex tasks simple.

Does your landing page creator have support for

HTML import and editing?

This provides greater flexibility around design and

creative efforts.

Are web pages shared across campaigns in your product?

In many cases, the web pages you create will be

useful in more than one campaign or for more than

one list. Allowing your web pages to be shared across

campaigns and lists saves time and fosters messaging

consistency across campaigns.

Will web pages that include forms pre-populate those

forms with existing subscriber data?

People are more likely to complete forms if they don’t

have to enter information they know you already have

about them.

Does your product help ensure my web pages are

optimized for mobile devices?

It’s critical that your web content renders elegantly

on mobile phones. Make sure your provider has the

necessary data about mobile phone types (from

resources like the WURFL database) to ensure your web

content can be optimized for specific devices.

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ProduCts ProMotions

Why These Matter

Promotions are the fuel for your subscriber growth engine.

Most providers focus on helping you manage customer databases and subscriber lists. Very few also offer the tools you need grow your database.

Promotions like coupons, sweepstakes, polls, trivia and surveys offer you ready-made solutions to excite customers and offer them value for joining and staying subscribed to your lists.

Make sure your provider offers promotions you can run via SMS, web and social media for maximum reach and impact. Also be sure all the data you collect from these promotions are stored to the same

database where all your customer and subscriber information is housed.

Coupons

Does your product have the ability to create web

coupons that can be sent via text message, email or

social media post?

Coupons are the most effective tool to encourage

people to become subscribers, fans or followers and

to stay engaged after they do. Make sure your provider

provides the ability to create them.

Does your web coupon creator have a simple

WYSIWYG interface?

Ease of use contributes to greater efficiency and

increased productivity. Make sure your provider has a

commitment to making complex tasks simple.

Does your product offer support for customizing web

coupon designs? If so, can I create my own HTML

design templates and upload them or can I only edit

the HTML in the templates you provide?

The ability to customize web coupon design templates,

either by creating your own from scratch or by editing

HTML in existing templates, provides complete design

control and flexibility.

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Do you have options to prevent abuse in the

redemption of web coupons created in your product?

Setting limits around the redemption of your web

coupons, such as capping the number of time the

coupon can be viewed and personalizing coupons so

they can’t be shared or used by others, are important

features to prevent abuse. Make sure your provider

offers such restrictions.

Can I embed barcodes that work with my POS system

in web coupons created in your product? If so, which

barcode types do you support?

If tracking coupon redemption at the POS is critical to

your business, make sure your provider can support

barcode insertion in coupons and that it can support the

type of barcode specific to your POS system.

Does your product offer Sweepstakes campaigns that

support entry via text message, web page, Facebook

and Twitter?

Sweepstakes promotions can be an effective way

to encourage people to join your email and SMS

subscriber lists to collect valuable demographic and

preference information for future marketing. They are

most effective when you have the ability to collect

entries from multiple channels. Make sure your provider

has the ability to do this.

Does your product offer Polling campaigns that

support entry via text message and web page?

Polls can be a fun tool to engage subscribers, while you

also use their poll responses to build your database of

insights about them. Allow customers to answer the poll

via SMS or web page to create greater participation.

Does your product offer text message surveys?

Building an SMS survey to collect demographic

information is an effective way to gather insights

from on-the-go consumers.

Can I run a text message trivia campaign using

your product?

Trivia campaigns are an enjoyable way to engage your

current subscribers or drive new subscriptions. Trivia

responses can also be used to build your database of

insights about subscribers.

For promotions like polls and trivia, does your product

support insertion of live campaign results into

response text messages?

For people who vote in a poll, or answer trivia or

survey questions, it’s important to show them other’s

responses to keep them engaged. You can even ask

them to join your list before voting to see the results.

If I am running a promotion either sponsored by a

cellular carrier or with rules or content specific to

certain carriers, do you support the customization of

text message campaign responses based on carrier?

If you run promotions that have any carrier-specific

messaging needs, it’s critical that your provider

support the ability to deliver dynamic text message

content for each carrier.

Sweepstakes/Contests

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Does your product support the ability to clone

promotions for reuse?

Sometimes you’ll want to run a promotion that has

the same options as one you ran previously. Cloning

or duplicating past promotions can save time and

create efficiencies.

Does your product support customizable entry form

design for promotions like sweepstakes and polling?

Customizing web landing pages and forms gives

complete flexibility in design.

Does your product support scheduling of promotion

start and end dates?

Scheduling of promotion start and end dates ensures

consistency with published terms and rules for

campaigns like sweepstakes.

Does your product support the ability to enforce age

restrictions before being allowed to enter a campaign

via text message or web form?

Age restrictions are critical for certain brands or

promotions that involve content only appropriate for

certain audiences (e.g., alcohol products).

Does your product support the ability to collect

customer data before or after participation in a

promotion (e.g., email address, preferences, etc.)?

Having the option to collect customer data before or

after promotion entry gives complete flexibility over

campaign design.

Does your product have the ability to ask entrants

to subscribe to your email and text message lists

upon entry?

For most promotions, a key goal should be to turn entries

into subscribers in order to keep the conversation with

your customer going beyond the promotion.

Will information about which promotions my

customers entered and the data about their entry

be stored in a database for me to use for future

campaign segmentation?

It’s important that the tools you use for running

promotions are tied directly to both a customer

database and to the tools you use to manage ongoing

email, SMS and social campaigns. This allows you to

have a complete picture of customer activity and leads

to more relevant and targeted communications.

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ProduCts list and data ManageMent

Why This Matters

Data quality and segmentation done right separates your marketing from the pack.

It’s important that you have the tools available to maintain an accurate and rich database of customer information. Without it, all of your efforts to segment and target

your marketing will be undermined.

Make sure your provider has a clear process for helping keep your database clean, in addition to easy-to-use options for creating segments based on that data

to make your targeting efforts simple.

What options do you provide for eliminating duplicate

contacts in your database? If I import subscribers

already in my database, will you de-duplicate them? If

someone already subscribed tries to subscribe again

via web form or SMS, will you create a new contact or

subscription or deduplicate it?

Having a clean and high-quality database is critical to

your marketing efforts. Make sure your provider has

the appropriate checks in place to eliminate duplicate

contacts or subscribers.

Am I able to create custom attributes that can be

assigned to subscribers in your database?

Supporting custom data attributes that are unique to

your business is necessary to maintain a complete data

set for reporting and segmentation.

Am I able to run batch data updates on any custom

attribute I create?

Batch updates help keep data up to date in an

efficient way.

Is there a limit to the number of contacts we can store

in your database?

Storing large data sets in a manner optimized for

segmentation and reporting is complex, and requires

a provider experienced in working with high volumes

of data.

Can I segment SMS and email messages sent

using your product by any combination of custom

attributes I create?

Robust segmentation provides the basis for more

relevant and targeted marketing.

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Does your product support list segmentation based

on participation in past campaigns?

Targeting your marketing based on campaign events

like email opens and promotion entries allows you

to hone your marketing efforts toward your most

receptive customers.

Does your product support the ability to create

customizable web signup forms to add email and SMS

subscribers to my lists?

Web forms are one of the core tools you’ll use to

ask customers to subscribe to your email and SMS

lists. Make sure your provider gives you the option to

customize the design and data fields you collect on

your form.

Can I easily upload subscribers and subscriber data

via Excel or CSV file? Can I export my contact and

subscriber data to an Excel or CSV file?

You should be able to get subscriber data into and out

of your database without hassle and in the formats you

prefer. Make sure your provider’s import and export

functionality includes values for the custom attributes

you create and the channels customers are subscribed to.

Can my subscribers edit their subscription preferences

(preferred messaging channels, interests, etc.) via a

web page provided by your product?

Show respect for your customers’ desire to be in control

of the information they receive from you by ensuring

your provider has an option for them to easily edit their

subscription preferences.

Is all the data about my subscribers (demographics,

preferences, campaign activity, etc.), regardless of

whether they are SMS or email subscribers, stored

in a single database?

Storing customer data including demographics,

preferences, and campaign activity across marketing

channels in one place gives you a complete view of

your customers and allows you to leverage this data in

sending both email and SMS campaigns.

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ProduCts rePorting and analytiCs

Why This Matters

The more transparent the results of your marketing are, the better your future marketing campaigns will be.

The only way you can improve is to get feedback on what is and isn’t working. Make sure your provider offers the reports and analysis you need to determine

which campaigns are a success. This means your provider should be looking beyond the basics of email open rates, SMS deliverability and social fan/follower counts

to offer you additional context, benchmark stats, to make continuous improvements.

What reports and analytics do you provide for my

contact database and subscriber lists?

Providers can offer a number of reporting options.

Make sure these are among them:

• Trends over time showing your subscriber growth (opt-

ins and opt-outs) by subscription type (email or SMS)

• Reports that show the campaigns (both email and SMS)

sent to your lists

• Summary stats that highlight the composition of

your database, such as demographics and attribute

ratios (e.g., 60% of your database are males, 25%

like pizza, etc.)

What reports and analytics do you provide for

understanding my text message marketing activity?



• Reports on SMS delivery and click rates on links you

include in your text messages

• Breakdowns of text messages you’ve sent by

cellular carrier

• Trends over time of your text messages sent and received

• Reports that allow you to search the history of text

messages sent by you and your customers

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understanding my email marketing activity?



• Email delivery stats such as bounces and unsubscribes

related to your campaigns, shown by the hour or day

after your campaign is sent

• Open and click rates on links you include in your emails,

shown by hour or day after your campaign is sent

• Trends over time of your emails sent

• Reports that allow you to search the history of email

messages sent by you and your customers


understanding my social media marketing activity?



• Trends over time showing your Facebook and Twitter

fan/follower growth, new fans/followers and lost

fans/followers

• Engagement metrics, such as comments, likes,

retweets and @ mentions, trended over time


understanding my marketing activity by location?



• Summary reports that show subscriber growth

across locations

• Summary reports that show campaign activity

across locations

• Reports that show you the best- and worst-

performing locations in terms of subscriber growth

and campaign activity

• Drill-down reports into individual locations to help you

diagnose why they are top or poor performers

Are your reports updated in real time?

It’s important to have an up-to-the-minute snapshot of

your customers and marketing activity.

Can I export data from your product to an Excel or

CSV file?

No matter how robust a provider’s reporting options are,

there is always a need to extract the data to analyze in

ways custom to you. Make sure you can export the data

you need for your core analyses.

Do you offer reports or notifications delivered to me

via email?

For the information most critical to you, make sure

your provider has options to automatically notify you

through email of key activity or data.

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ProduCts Multi-loCation Marketing

Why This Matters

When local marketing is at the heart of your business, make sure your digital marketing provider has it at the heart of theirs too.

Orchestrating marketing efforts at the corporate, regional and store levels is extraordinarily difficult. Whether or not your local marketing is centralized at corporate or spread out among franchises,

the challenge of making your marketing feel targeted and local to all your customers is great.

Seek out providers who have tools to help you manage rights and roles, approval workflows and location-based analytics that map directly to your business.

Does your product have the ability for me to create

a hierarchy of users based on role (e.g., corporate

marketer, regional manager, franchisee, etc.)?

For many businesses with multiple locations, various

layers of management are responsible for marketing

across these locations. If you have a franchise model

or similar hierarchy, make sure your provider allows to

create user roles that map to how your business works.

Can I control access rights for users at each level of

the hierarchy?

Sometimes you need to restrict the access certain users

have to features of your cross-channel marketing product

to ensure your brand standards are met. Make sure your

provide the ability to set such restrictions.

Can email or text messages created by certain users in

the hierarchy be subject to approval by other users that

have admin rights?

When you have scenario where some users may not

have authority to create and send campaigns without

approval, you need to have a workflow in your cross-

channel marketing product to require such approval

before those users can send messages.

Is it possible to create preapproved messages,

templates or designs that are locked for some users?

Cut down on your risks and the time it takes to approve

campaigns as they are created by providing users, such

as single location owners, the ability to choose from

content preapproved by you.

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Can users with admin rights “shadow” other users to

replicate their experience with product?

“Shadowing” users can be an invaluable tool when

troubleshooting issues those users may be having in

creating and sending campaigns.

Can I group contacts or subscribers by location or

groups of locations?

Whether it be a geographic region or shared attribute

(e.g., locations with an ATM attached), grouping your

locations by data relevant to you is important to make

sure your marketing efforts map to your business.

Can I segment my email and SMS campaigns by these

location segments (e.g., locations in the Northeast or

locations with an ATM attached)?

Segmentation based on locations with shared attributes

gives you added precision and relevancy in your

marketing messages.

Do you offer the option for me to add my brand logo

and a custom URL to your product?

Custom branding gives you the option to provide users a

seamless experience.

Do you provide a way for my customers to get

information about my store locations via their mobile

phone? If so, how? Does your system allow on-the-

go consumers to find your nearest store locations by

texting their zip code or offer code snippets to create a

web version based on GPS?

Nearly all of your customers have a need, at some point,

to find a location nearest them while they are on the go

and away from a computer.

Make sure your provider offers options to do this,

including:

• Allowing customers to text in their zip code to receive a

list of locations sorted by distance

• Providing a mobile web page that uses a phone’s

GPS to determine the customer’s location and

display locations nearest to them

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ProduCts integration

Why This Matters

Marketing can’t succeed when it’s trapped in silos. Ensure that your databases and tools can talk to each other.

Whether you have a loyalty platform, CRM system or internal database that you need to sync with your cross-channel marketing solution, make sure your provider has the experience

and product features (such as APIs) to make the integration process a seamless one.

What other products or providers do you or have you

integrated with?

It’s important to establish whether your cross-channel

marketing provider has experience integrating with

other tools or databases you may use to support your

marketing efforts.

Examples include:

• Your internal customer database, which may

contain information like purchase history or

loyalty program participation

• Your website or mobile apps

• CRM products you may use to manage customer

loyalty programs or offline marketing efforts

Can you create a bi-directional synchronization of data

between your product and my internal databases or

other CRM tools I use?

If you have internal customer databases for

information your cross-channel marketing platform

can’t provide or CRM tools for other marketing

actions, it’s important you have data sync between

them to ensure you have consistent, up-to-date data

and coordinated marketing activities.

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Do you provide application programming interfaces

(APIs) that can be used to perform some of the major

functions of your product or be used to integrate with

your product?

To effectively integrate with your other partners, it’s

almost necessary for your cross-channel marketing

provider to offer APIs that allow you and your partners to

access key information and features.

You should make sure your provider offers APIs to:

• Add subscribers (including custom attributes)

• Manage subscriber status

• Update customer data record (add/edit attribute

values, etc.)

• Send SMS and email messages

Does your product have the ability to call web services

using HTTP/HTTPS?

To successfully build the integrations you need, it’s likely

that your provider will need to use APIs and other web

services that either you or your other providers offer.

Make sure your provider can call these services using

the protocols that you and your other providers support.

Do you provide the ability to post updates to

customer and subscriber data to a URL (commonly

called a webhook)?

To keep multiple databases in sync, it’s important that

your cross-channel marketing provider can post changes

to subscriber status or customer profiles to you or your

other providers.

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PriCing, iMPleMentation, serviCes and suPPort

Why These Matter

Though the rides at Disneyland are incredible, you really go for the Disney experience. Similarly, a great product isn’t great without a terrific customer service experience to surround it.

Nothing is more frustrating than seeing a demo of an amazing product, only to discover tons of hidden fees and suspect support when you get started.

Make sure your provider is transparent with its pricing and the specifics for its implementation process. Also, make sure it has a clear structure

for supporting your needs after the initial training and implementation period. You’ll be most successful when your provider has a deep commitment

to getting close to your business and becoming an extension of your marketing team.

Please provide details on how you price your product.

Cross-channel marketing providers price their solutions

in a variety of ways (monthly subscription, annual

license, charge by message volume, charge by number

of subscribers/database records, etc.). Make sure you

understand each provider’s pricing structure and how

they compare.

What other costs are involved with your solution,

beyond costs for the product itself? For example,

what are the costs of training/onboarding, account

support, etc.?

Be clear on the services costs and other related

fees you may incur to manage your cross-channel

marketing campaigns.

If I need to integrate your product with other databases

or tools I use, what is the cost?

It’s important to work with your cross-channel marketing

provider up front to determine your integration needs

and any associated costs.

Do you provide a dedicated account manager and

training program to help us get started with the product?

A dedicated account manager can help cut down on

implementation time, meaning you can get up and

running quickly for fast results.

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Do you have an online support and best practices

center? If so, how regularly is it updated?

You don’t want to have to always rely on an account

manager to answer your questions and help optimize your

campaigns. A useful support center and knowledge base

is essential to getting the most out of a product.

Please provide a typical timeline for implementation.

The faster you implement marketing automation, the

faster you can achieve ROI on your purchase. Make

sure it’s clear how long it will take for you to get up and

running and what the steps are in the process.

What is the process for uploading my existing data?

Uploading your existing data is a critical initial step when

on-boarding with a provider. Make sure the process is

clear to you and you’re comfortable with how your data

will be handled.

Can you provide details of any available, optional

services that your company provides?

If offered, services like creative design and consulting

can improve the quality of your cross-channel

marketing efforts.

How frequently does your company have new

product releases and how is training done on new

features and functionality? Will there be a cost for

additional training?

Cross-channel marketing is an evolving technology.

Your provider should be constantly improving its

product without passing on additional costs when new

enhancements arrive.

Is your solution offered as a hosted service or will we

need to install it on our servers?

SaaS products are much easier to get up and running, so

seek out providers with hosted solutions.

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seCurity, systeMs and dataWhy These Matter

Your data is your business. Make sure your provider has the same commitment to security as you do.

Given some recent high-profile breaches of customer data stored with marketing platforms, you need to ensure your provider has the appropriate checks and balances in place

to prevent you from being the next headline.

In addition, it’s important that you push your provider to offer the details of that technology infrastructure, including information like its historical uptime, to feel confident

that your marketing efforts won’t be interrupted by an unstable platform.

What security practices do you employ to prevent

unauthorized access to data?

Your customers trust you with their data. Make sure

your provider has a clear and defensible process in

place to ensure that there are no holes that would

allow others access to that data.

Describe your software architecture.

Your provider should use web frameworks that have a

large install base and are frequently updated.

What data storage software and hardware do you use?

Not all data is created and stored equally. Companies

that employ NoSQL data storage mechanisms to

complement traditional relational database storage

have a strong understanding of how to roll up data for

reporting and analytics.

How is data segregated or partitioned in your system?

Your provider needs to have thought through how data

is isolated between its customers. You don’t want your

data to be accessed by your provider’s other customers.

Describe your hosted infrastructure.

Look for providers that tap into both dedicated and cloud

servers as they likely understand the power of dedicated

machines for data processing and cloud based instances

to scale up with traffic/processing needs.

How frequently is your software updated in production?

Seek out providers that make frequent changes rather

than releasing monthly or quarterly updates.

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What testing procedures do you employ to prevent

issues from happening in production?

Look for providers that use a mix of automated and

manual QA. Neither approach on its own will ensure

that a product is free of bugs.

What is your SLA?

Target 99.9% uptime with the ability to quickly produce

historical reports.

What web browsers does your system support?

Look for the broadest support possible so your users

have the freedom to use their preferred browser when

accessing the product.

How do you inform customers of outages, upgrades

and maintenance?

Make sure your provider has an established process for

downtime notifications that they can articulate in writing.

Also make sure that process gives you enough advance

notice to ensure your teams can plan appropriately.

What is your commitment to R&D as a percentage of

your total expenditure dedicated to improvements?

You want to work with providers who are committed

to keeping up with the changing landscape of cross-

channel marketing. Ideally, your provider will look to

include you on beta tests and other RandD efforts to

help you stay on the cutting edge.

Please provide a high-level technical architecture

diagram of your solution and how it integrates with

our existing infrastructure and consumer touch points.

Having a technical diagram makes it easier for you

to consult with your internal technical teams or other

providers that will integrate with this product.

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CoMPany inforMationWhy This Matters

Know who you’re working with and make sure their company is a good fit for yours.

Choosing a cross-channel marketing provider is a big investment. You’ll likely be switching from multiple providers to their solution and your goal is to establish a long-term relationship.

Make sure your provider has the history, staying power and financial stability to not only meet your needs today but also to grow at a rapid pace to meet your needs tomorrow.

Please provide your company details, including registered

company name, address and registration number.

This is important information to help research

potential providers.

Please provide your primary contact details in

relation to this activity, including contact name,

role, telephone number and email.

Be clear about who your point of contacts are so you

don’t waste time in the process of evaluating providers.

Please provide a document that gives an overview

of your company and products.



Please describe your organizational structure

including the names and titles of key team members.



Please provide information on any current industry

standards or accreditations you have obtained and

any industry awards won in the last two years.



What is your employee retention rate and average

lifespan at your company?

Make sure you work with a provider that has a strong

track record of retaining employees. This is a strong

leading indicator of the quality of product and service

you’ll receive.

Please provide a list of customers.

Make sure the provider you choose has experience

with companies like yours.

Please describe your largest customer.

Understanding the top end of customer type a

provider works with can help you evaluate its capacity

to support your needs.

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Please provide three references that are current customers.

Contact:

Company Name:

Title:

Email:

Phone:

Launch Date:

Contact:

Company Name:

Title:

Email:

Phone:

Launch Date:

Contact:

Company Name:

Title:

Email:

Phone:

Launch Date:

1

2

3

Documents

Cross channel marketing rfp