• by Ray Schultz , Columnist, June 30, 2017

Everyone know that Gmail is the leading email service: it was repeated ad nauseam last week when Google announced it would no longer scan email content to drive ads.  But how do you quantify that?  

By doing a survey, of course. Morning Consult polled 2,528 people and found that 44% use Gmail most frequently, compared to 26% for Yahoo. Outlook claims 10%, Hotmail 7% and AOL Mail 7%. Mail.com and iCloud Mail barely track.

In addition, 70% have a Gmail account, whether they use it most often or not. Overall, Gmail is viewed very favorably by 48%, and somewhat favorably by 33%.

Yahoo Mail fares far worse in this area, with 28% having a very favorable opinion of it, and 37% having a somewhat favorable view. Mail.com has only a 9% very favorable rating, and worse, 32% never heard of it. So Gmail wins again.

But here’s a question: Just who are these people?

Well, first of all, they’re Millennials: Gmail claims 61% of them, and 54% of the GenXers — as their most frequently used service. Older folks tend to flock to Yahoo Mail, with 31% saying they use it most often, compared to 24% for Gmail.  

But let’s drill down into the cross-tabs put together by Morning Consult. We’re not trying to cause trouble for Gmail — or ourselves. But 52% of Hillary Clinton voters have a very favorable view of Gmail, compared with 42% of Donald Trump supporters. 

Does this reflect a GOP antipathy toward Google? Don’t blame it on the survey sample: It includes 867 Trump voters vs. 835 Clinton.

The Democratic skew even includes past presidents and candidates. Barack Obama voters 52% favor Gmail, whereas the service is beloved by only 38% of Mitt Romney voters. And 56% liberals have a very favorable view, compared with 43% of conservatives. But 54% of Tea Party supporters are very positive, so go figure. And Gmail scores best across all income ranges — with just under half.

Meanwhile, Morning Consult reports that 61% of Hispanics have a very favorable view of Gmail, compared with 58% of African-Americans and 46% of Caucasians.  

As for religion, atheists are first, with 53% having a very favorable view of Gmail. In terms of affiliation, the lineup is Jewish (52%), Roman Catholic (49%) and Evangelicals (48%).

In contrast, only 19% of atheists favor Yahoo Mail, compared with 30% of Jewish consumers, 39% of Evangelicals and 26% of Roman Catholics. 

For the record, Adestra came up with very similar results about Gmail use in a recent consumer survey. It showed that 83.5% of teens prefer Gmail, compared to 77% of Millennials and 43% of Baby Boomers (up from 28% in 2016).

Why do young people favor Gmail? Because “they see Google-branded products as a cool thing,” Adestra writes.

However, the Adestra survey is a little different in that Outlook ranks second. But that’s not saying much: Outlook attracts only 4.2% of teens, 5.8% of Millennials and 22.6% of the Boomers.

YahooMail is third, claiming 6.9% of the teens, 5.8% of the Millennials and 13.7% of the Boomers. AOL, iCloud and Comcast are in the low single digits across the board. 

Adestra sums it up: “Master Gmail if you want your messages to reach your subscribers, no matter how old they are. Yes, Gmail is also the service that makes some marketers nervous given its rigorous spam filtering and its tabbed inboxes, but we're now seeing new research about the effects of these innovations are having on email performance. The news isn't all bad, we promise! Regardless, it's still the one you have to get right.”