According to a new eROI study titled, "Email Marketing, On the Go," the new inbox is always on and always moving, and quickly becoming one of the more challenging aspects of marketing.
With the rapid growth of mobile device usage, increased portability of email addresses to mobile clients (using POP3 or IMAP), the report addresses the need to gain a deep understanding of
when, where and how subscribers are reading and interacting with marketing communications.
Optimizing communications for the subscriber's environment no longer just refers to
what email client they are using, notes the report. It now also extends to the device they are on, the setting in which they are likely to be (personal or business), and their physical
location.
When optimizing to ensure desired action, says the report, many have always considered the "when" factors and "where" factors but the study finds that
they must be coupled with additional influences such as:
- If sent at a certain time, where will subscribers likely be when they get your email?
- Will they be in a
personal setting, or a business setting?
- Will they be out and about on their mobile devices or sitting at their computer?
In a previous study, "The Current State
of Social, Mobile and Email Integration," eROI found that a majority of the marketers surveyed were aware that their subscribers were using mobile devices, but nearly two-thirds were
unaware of their customers' actual mobile usage patterns, nor did they have a clear plan in place to find out.
The current study reaches out to 20 big-brand ecommerce, retail
and publishing marketers to learn more about their awareness of the changing consumer inbox. The participants were asked to estimate what they believed the mobile read
rate of their audience to be. Then, partnering with Litmus, eROI tracked and measured how subscribers actually received and engaged with each email campaign and
communication they received over the course of 30 days.
Environment is no longer just a factor in the "readability" of our communication, it is now a factor in ensuring desired
action as well, says the report. The study concludes that the device subscribers are on causes optimization efforts to extend beyond the inbox. Knowing that layouts of emails and content pages
can display differently for each email client and device, understanding the rendering engines that subscribers are using most often can help to better focus on testing, coding and
approach for a better display experience.
Rendering Agents |
Safari/Chrome | 26% |
Firefox | 14 |
MS Word | 5 |
Other | 5 |
Mobile | 49 |
Source: eROI, Email Marketing On the Go, December 2010 |
When asked to estimate what percentage of their subscribers read
emails on an iPhone, iPad, Android or other mobile device, responses that ranged from 2% all the way up to 50%. Those who estimated on the higher end were basing it on the time of day
and day of week that they were sending.
Estimated Mobile Client/Device Use for
Reading Emails |
Outlook | 31% |
Yahoo mail | 15 |
Live/Hotmail | 11 |
Apple Mail | 10 |
Apple iPhone | 9 |
Gmail | 7 |
Web versions | 6 |
Android | 3 |
Other | 7 |
Source: eROI, Email Marketing On the Go, December 2010 |
For most participants, their individual results shifted significantly based on
the time-of-day and day-of-week that emails were sent. As we expected however, since people are more likely to be on the go during the weekend, almost all results showed that from
Thursday afternoon through Monday morning subscribers were engaging with email on mobile devices at a much higher rate than during the standard workweek.
Messaging Usage |
Device
Type | Weekly Peak | Daily Peak |
Mobile | Sun, Fri, Sat | 12-9 AM, 5-12 PM |
Desktop | Mon-Thu | 9 AM - 5PM |
Source: eROI, Email Marketing On the Go, December
2010 |
The report concludes by noting that we are moving out of the awkward teen years of mobile and rapidly moving into a technology that is maturing
at an accelerated rate. The onslaught of mobile devices is changing how people communicate and consume information. Marketers are recognizing the need to expand optimization efforts
past the desktop to include smart phones and tablets to gain or simply just keep "mindshare."
For the complete report in a PDF file, please visit eROI here.