Email marketing campaigns have a questionable reputation in the internet marketing industry. Despite being incredibly cost effective and highly targeted, the general view of the practice is that it’s an outdated and largely unsuccessful form of marketing.
However, this perception seems to be just a product of how much internet marketing has developed over the years. But, as statistics show, not only is email marketing as successful as ever but also, it’s only going to grow.
The Figures
eMarketer, a leading internet marketing company, recently released figures on a study of email campaigns, showing that since 2010:
* Average non-bounce rates have increased from 94.7% to 96.5%.
* Open rates increased by 3.8% from 22.4%
* The only negative trend is that Clickthroughs decreased to 4.7% from 6%
* It’s still more successful than PPC and display advertising for B2B online marketers
It’s maintained success and growth is largely due to the ever-increasing dependence on email as a cheap and dependable communication form. Particularly with the popularity of email capable smartphones over the last few years.
The Mobile Generation
Mobile device users are more likely to use their internet for email and social networking than in-depth browsing so they’re exposed to email ads more than any other medium. In fact, figures show that around 20% of email marketing messages are opened on mobile devices, with Desktop and tablet accounting for 72% and 6.7%, respectively.
As such, it’s incredibly important that your marketing emails are viewable on these devices so that they don’t have problems opening it. Peoples growing expectation of a positive user experience and general level of disinterest in advertising can mean missing a massive market segment with a compatibility blunder.
Success Depends on Industry and Target Market
To elaborate further on the mobile results, iPhone accounted for over three quarters of the opened emails and Android for most of the rest. This indicates that more middle to upper-middle class professional markets are responsible for the figures, which makes this option less attractive for mass-marketers.
Financial services and specialised coupon messages showed the highest clickthrough rates, as these offer specific value to recipients, making them more likely to convert as they become “baited” by the offer.
Integrate Campaigns Into Your Marketing Strategy
Integrating email marketing with your other digital marketing efforts and business data can help inform your campaigns by providing more detailed targeting data on your list and ensuring the content is compelling and of value to them.
Like many marketing activities, it’s important not to see email marketing as a stable revenue source but rather as a tool of an overall marketing strategy. These campaigns help maintain top-of-mind awareness for your brand and enhances your relationship with customers.