For the past 14 years, MailerMailer has been conducting an annual email marketing study. This year’s Email Marketing Metrics Report, which was released this month, analyzed 1.18 billion email messages that were sent during 2013. Email marketing is still an extremely effective marketing tool, so brand marketers should pay attention to these findings.
The good news is that email marketing open rates increased in 2013. The bad news is that click rates decreased in 2013.
The analysts at MailerMailer suggest that the increased use of mobile devices to check email played a role in causing click rates to go down. It makes sense. People check their email far more frequently thanks to their smartphones and tablets, but taking the time to click through and read content is often delayed until they’re at a desktop computer (or completely forgotten).
Tips to Increase Email Marketing Success
Based on the findings in the Email Marketing Metrics Report, there are several things brand marketers can do to boost the return on investment for their email marketing programs. First, consider sending your email marketing messages on Mondays. This is the day of the week when open rates peaked in 2013. Furthermore, since email messages were found in this study to be opened most often in the first half of the day (most likely in chronological order), send your email marketing messages in the evening or during the night to get the highest open and click rates the next morning.
You should also pay attention to your subject lines. Email marketing messages with subject lines that were limited to just 4-15 characters had the highest open rates and click rates in 2013. However, even the best subject lines can’t fight bad timing.
Not only does the day of the week and time of day that you send your email messages have significant effects on your results, but the window of opportunity that you have to successfully connect with consumers via email marketing is very small. MailerMailer discovered that most email marketing messages are opened within just a few hours of delivery. However, open rates peak approximately one hour after an email marketing message is delivered.
Follow the link at the beginning of this article to read the complete report. It’s filled with interesting statistics that you can use to develop better email marketing campaigns during the fourth quarter of 2014 and in 2015. Most importantly, keep on testing your email marketing campaigns to determine what works best for your industry, your target customers, your offers, and your goals. One size does not fit all when it comes to email marketing.
Image: Sergio Roberto Bichara
Susan Gunelius is the author of 10 marketing, social media, branding, copywriting, and technology books, and she is President & CEO of KeySplash Creative, Inc., a marketing communications company. She also owns Women on Business, an award-wining blog for business women. She is a featured columnist for Entrepreneur.com and Forbes.com, and her marketing-related articles have appeared on websites such as MSNBC.com, BusinessWeek.com, TodayShow.com, and more.
She has over 20 years of experience in the marketing field having spent the first decade of her career directing marketing programs for some of the largest companies in the world, including divisions of AT&T and HSBC. Today, her clients include large and small companies around the world and household brands like Citigroup, Cox Communications, Intuit, and more. Susan is frequently interviewed about marketing and branding by television, radio, print, and online media organizations, and she speaks about these topics at events around the world. You can connect with her on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Google+.
