This week, we welcome Posta Novathe email solution of the Novius agency. It is Thibaut PeyssonProduct Manager who answers our questions. If you have experience with the platform, feel free to give your opinion in the comments.
Can you give us a brief history of Posta Nova? When was the platform founded, by whom, and has the business model evolved since the beginning?
Before the creation of Posta-Nova, we used external emailing solutions to meet our customers' needs. Some of these tools are still on the market. In practice, we realized that these solutions often had a plethora of features, making them less accessible to everyone. Sending an e-mail was often an ordeal for inexperienced users. What was missing was a simple tool where content takes precedence over function.
It was against this backdrop that the R&D teams created Posta-Nova in 2003. Two of the first customers to use it were Les Echos newspaper and the International Ski Federation. At the time, Posta-Nova was symbolized by a swallow. Around 2005, when the emailing platform joined the Novius software ecosystem, it took the name Posta-Nova and its logo became a dragonfly. Since then, Posta-Nova has grown enormously over the years to become a market-recognized emailing platform used daily by major accounts. Its success is due to its scalable system, which enables it to offer tailor-made templates that can be fully personalized for each mailing.
What makes Posta Nova unique? What makes you different compared to other players in this highly competitive market?
Posta-Nova stands out for its ease of use and efficient routing. It has been designed to be accessible to all, and with each evolution we strive to avoid overloading the software with overly specific features. Posta-Nova relies on a high-performance routing infrastructure and particular attention to anti-spam policies to offer, in all our offers, real guarantees in terms of deliverability.
But Novius' emailing offer isn't just about software. Many of our projects require technical customization. Novius is a digital communications agencyOur teams can therefore offer a wide range of customized developments to interface emailing activities with existing web and IS systems. In addition to our expertise in the creation of customized dynamic templates in responsive web design, we regularly create synchronizations to simplify newsletter/emailig management: synchronization for multi-distribution of content, for newsletter subscribers from the site, interfacing with a CRM tool, setting up a webzine...
Last but not least, we pay particular attention to supporting our customers. We're always ready to make suggestions for the design and development of our customers' email marketing systems.
What do you see as the 3 major challenges for the coming months in the world of email marketing?
Emailing faces a number of challenges, as it is still one of the most popular means of communication on the Internet. It will have to face up to the multi-screen revolution, which consists firstly in adapting email to the user's screen, and secondly to his or her mode of consumption: short reading on a smartphone and long reading on a tablet or desktop. On these points, there's still a lot of progress to be made, and 2013 should surprise us as to emailing's ability to bridge the gap between screens.
Another major challenge is that emailing must continue to evolve towards a multi-channel approach. It will be necessary to multiply the number of effective gateways to social media, but also to simplify the management of multi-distribution of content. Content present on an editorial site must be easily distributed to any type of medium: social media, newsletters, emailing. Don't forget that a newsletter is often based on the same content, with only the graphics and organization changing according to the medium!
But these are all tools! For us, the biggest challenge is the customer's "emailing culture". At Novius, we believe that the success of an email marketing project lies first and foremost in the customer's strategy. That's why the role of support remains central.
What are the next evolutions of your platform?
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We have a continuous improvement approach to all our software, so Posta-Nova is constantly evolving. Upcoming projects include the integration of Posta-Nova with Novius OS, an OpenSource CMS we developed ourselves. This will enable customers to manage their website and email campaigns directly from a single back-office. A huge time-saver for communications teams, and above all an opportunity to better understand the impact of their campaigns on their web device.
We'll also be launching an online press offering. Today, we have strong expertise in the Webzine format, where email plays a central role. Webzines are a response to the multi-channel needs mentioned above. Customers such as Docnews and the Syndicat National de Ski Français (French national ski association) are now measuring the time saved in managing and distributing their news.
Do you offer your customers a "Freemium" mode (free version with reduced functionality)?
We do not offer a freemium mode. However, we do offer a test account opening module to enable you to discover the tool.
Why not use this model?
This model is particularly well suited to self-provisioning solutions. Internet users are totally autonomous: they create their test account, buy credit directly on the platform, and up to 2 years can go by without having discussed their project with a contact. As we mentioned earlier, we are convinced that the success of an emailing project depends on a good understanding of the customer's communication objectives. This is why we choose to contact people who have created a demo account directly, to study their needs and propose a suitable solution.
What do you think of the French emailing market? Is it mature or is there still room for new innovations?
The French email marketing market is highly competitive. In this sense, it has reached a certain maturity. However, despite preconceived ideas, it's a market that continues to enjoy 2-digit growth every year. The historical pureplayers remain, and new players are regularly appearing. One factor may explain this phenomenon: innovation is an integral part of the market. It's innovation that keeps emailing appealing to communications managers. It enables players to differentiate themselves and build loyalty among those who place their trust in them. If we take a closer look at the positioning of the various players on the French market, we can see that there are many ways to differentiate through innovation:
- Customized services: Implementation of templates in responsive web design, support in the conception, the design adapted to the email marketing;
- Additional tools on the platform: A/B testing, trigger marketing, CRM, creation of templates on the platform;
- Related services: attention to deliverability;
- Multi-channel integration: setting up a webzine, links to analytics, to social media, integration of the solution with the customer's existing systems;
- Navigation comfort: work on the UX (user experience) and UI (user interface) user).
As a market professional, we have a duty to continue offering new products. I don't know if the reception medium and the way we consume information will be the same in the years to come. But one thing's for sure: opportunities are and will continue to be created by innovation.
A last word to conclude?
First of all, thank you for this initiative!
In conclusion, we're convinced that email marketing has a very bright future and enormous potential. That's why it's vital that our solutions continue to open up to related markets: social media, corporate social networks, webzines, mobile applications... The market needs to maintain its ability to reinvent itself. That's the only way it can keep pace with the evolution of email reading.
