SmallBusinessNewz

Not too long ago, Circuit City more or less died.  Signs promoting clearance sales appeared, stores' shelves emptied, and then the doors were locked and the lights went out.  CircuitCity.com isn't in bad shape, though, and an email campaign played a big part in getting the site back on its feet.

Yes, yes, Circuit City isn't a small business.  But since its bankruptcy was so public an affair, it's hard not to wonder if small businesses that haven't suffered humiliation on a national level stand to gain even more from email campaigns.

 (Credit: Hitwise)

Check out the above graph.  Hitwise's Heather Dougherty writes, "Last week, 84% of the visitors to CircuitCity.com were new, or had not visited in the past 30 days.  Much of the surge in traffic can be attributed to an email campaign to reach out to potential CircuitCity.com customers since nearly 33% of the upstream traffic was referred by web-based email services."

Now, CircuitCity.com is tenth in Hitwise's "Appliances and Electronics" category, whereas it was number 26 not too long ago.

If you're not in the habit of conducting email campaigns, it might be a very good idea to see what one can do for your company.