Why Having a Preference Center is Key to Your Email Marketing Strategy | Salesforce Marketing Cloud

As Marketing Technology consultant, DemandBlue interacts with many digital marketers. Our team audits the full range of digital marketing assets that organizations manage. Based on our experience, we find that one of the most underrated assets in the email marketing strategy is the Preference Center.

Marketers said the following when we asked, “why do you need a preference center in the first place?”

• • All the emailing platforms mandate it
  • CAN-SPAM Act requires it
  • It is an easy way to let people unsubscribe

And there were a few more trivial reasons that were quoted. In reality, is the preference center helpful to manage the unsubscribes and fulfilling the CAN-SPAM Requirements? Not really.

Most Marketers see the preference center as an asset that can only be used as an email footer; however, that’s not the case. A preference center is a powerful tool that can be leveraged across various engagement touchpoints with your target audiences.

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Most websites have sign-up forms to capture email addresses and names that are added to a generic list and list members receive generic emails. Often, as soon as an individual completes a form, they receive an additional pop-up where they can select areas of interest or other indicators of activities; these are known as preference pages. From that point, the seller or merchant sends user-tailored content to the individual. These messages are opened with a higher frequency rate. The benefits:

• • Brand trust improves
  • Open rates and click-through increase
  • Overall engagement metrics improve

The above one is a simple use case. There are multiple other ways you will be able to leverage the preference center. Here are a few:

• • Multilingual preference pages and emails based on preferences in the past
  • Collect personalized information such as birthdays
  • Provide options to select, deselect, or change preferences anytime
  • Provision to connect with your reps

With Salesforce Marketing Cloud or Pardot features, preference center features can be easily leveraged. Preference Center is a key asset in your digital marketing strategy. We also wanted to emphasize a few best practices:

• • Always have a mobile-friendly version as most individuals favor their smartphone over a computer
  • Highlight your brand on the preference center real estate
  • Have minimal but enough options for your audience to make reasonable preference choices
  • Accessibility guidelines should be considered
  • The option to unsubscribe needs to be distinct

Check out another amazing blog by DemandBlue here: Fast Track your Marketing Activities and Enhance User Experience with DemandBlue's Salesforce Marketing Cloud Accelerators

DemandBlue’s Marketing technology practice has been built with a strong focus on understanding customers, not just from a technology viewpoint but also from a functional perspective. Today, DemandBlue’s team works with Marketers across non-profits, retail, high-tech industries, and financial segments to ensure a high return on investment and maximum use of digital assets.