• by Ray Schultz , Columnist, October 21, 2022

 A whole body of theory has been built on the belief that email is not supposed to be used for acquisition. But marketers are rethinking that, judging by Unleash the Power of Acquisition Email, a study from Data Axle, conducted by SurveyMonkey.  

Of the marketers polled, 77% believe an acquisition campaign delivers higher ROI when it includes email. But 28% don’t use email for prospecting because they are not sure whether it is compliant with consumer privacy laws and guidelines.  

Still, 58% would utilize email for this if their vendor could prove the emails are privacy-compliant. Slightly more than half — 53.3% — believe acquisition email is compliant, but 32.4% disagree and 14.3% say “it depends.”

Overall, 56.56% say their current acquisition marketing strategy is enabling them to hit their goals and KPIs. But 10.66% say it is not, and 28.28%  feel it is working only somewhat, while 14.51% are unsure. 

Of those surveyed, 66% say they use email marketing to engage with existing customers, and that it’s working well. But 27.9% feel it is not working well, and 6.1% didn’t know it was an option.  

The numbers change when marketers are asked if they are using email  to acquire new customers: 

• Yes, and it’s working well—53.3% 
• Yes, but it doesn’t work well—32.4%
• No, I didn’t know that it was an option—14.3%

Marketers give these reasons for not using acquisition email until recently:

• I wasn’t aware you could email contacts not in my CRM—23.4% 
• I have heard of this channel but didn’t think it was compliant—27.9% 
• I had it before but didn’t get good results—24.1% 
• It was too expensive—9% 
• It’s not a channel that’s top of mind—15.6%

How do brands use acquisition email? 

The study urges marketers to ask these questions if they plan to use email for acquisition:

• Are all of your emails permissioned in a way that people have opted in to receive third-party offers and messages?
• Is your data obtained, stored and operationalized in a way that protects consumer privacy?
• Is your data compliant with GDPR, DMA, CCPA, HIPAA, ISO and SISA?
• How do you ensure the security of your data?

SurveyMonkey surveyed 244 marketers tasked with customer acquisition and retention efforts across both B2C and B2B brands in August 2022.