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For more on email marketing go to www.b2bm.biz/digital
Email supplement
7
Email marketers
raise their game
Email marketers are becoming more sophisticated in maintaining the effectiveness of this
channel in the wake of rising volumes and overloaded inboxes, according to DMA research
T
he DMA produces quarterly
research into email marketing
Fig 1
Q3 07
80%
trends from across the UK.
Although it doesn’t distinguish
70%
between B2B and B2C activity, it is
60%
possible to use the findings to distinguish
Q1 07
Q1 07
some interesting trends, by looking at the
50%
average figures for the past two years.
tion
40%
First and foremost segmentation is
increasing. In the last 12 months, the 30%
number of companies who do not segment
Q1 07
their data at all has shrunk from 50 per
Segmenta
Q3 07
20%
cent to 17 per cent (see Figure 1). This Q1 07 Q3 0710%
demonstrates that email marketers are
Q3 07
increasingly realising that better
0
Don’t segment Segment into Segment into Segment into
segmentation has a direct correlation with
our lists 2/3 different 4/6 different more than 6
audiences audiences different audiences
increased results.
Open rates on the slide
Fig 2
35%
Not such good news, however, is that open
2006
rates for email have declined for both
30%
acquisition and retention messages (see
2007
Figure 2). This corresponds with the 25%
general feeling that many recipients are
suffering from email fatigue, and that many
20%
more emails may be being deleted without
a
t
e
s
even being opened.
15%
These are known as ‘soft’ opt-outs,
Open r
where to all intents and purposes the
10%
individual has opted out from email, but
5%
has not done so officially or explicitly. This
may explain why actual opt-outs are also
0
declining (see Figure 3) rather than rising
Acquisition Retention Acquisition Retention
as might be expected. Many recipients may
have become used to deleting emails in a
Fig 3
wholesale fashion. Delivery rates have also
3%
declined during this period, although this is
countered by the fact that bounce rates are
also shrinking.
2%
Better news is that click rates have
a
t
e
s
2006 2007
remained static for both acquisition and
retention emails during the last two years,
t
-
out r
with the former at seven per cent and the
Op
1%
later dropping one point to ten per cent.
The figures demonstrate that as attitudes to
email evolve, so marketers must develop
their campaigns to maintain effectiveness.
0
Acquisition Retention Acquisition Retention
B2BM JUNE 08 – www.b2bm.biz
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