Retailers have attracted more email subscribers but engagement has decreased over time. While the proportion of active subscribers increased 8% from 2013-2015, the proportion who last engaged over a year ago also increased 7%. Additionally, marketers continue to spend less on email despite its good ROI. While email provides a relatively cheap way to generate orders, marketers don't increase spending to maintain subscriber interest levels. Finally, factors inhibiting successful campaigns have shifted from resource limitations to issues with data quality and a lack of relevant, targeted content.

1. source: yesmail benchmark reports
1. the churn in retail email engagement...
So what ?
On the one hand retailers are doing a better job at attracting active subscribers. But in 2015, a
larger proportion of 'active' subscribers last engaged with an email more than 12 months
previously. So retailers have attracted more active subscribers but a higher proportion of
those subscribers seem to lose interest and churn. This highlights the constant challenge of
email relevancy and targeting for retailers in order to maintain interest levels and
engagement.
-7% +8%
The percentage
point increase in
the proportion of
subscribers who
were last active
over a year ago
within the retail
sector.
2 STATS TO PROVE A POINTCURATED STATS AND THEIR IMPLICATIONS - MONTHLY ROUND-UP FOR AUG 2015
2. Great roi but the budget goes down...
The proportion of
company andagency
respondents who rated
email marketing as
‘excellent’ in terms of
providing a ROI.
So what ?
Marketers continue to spend less on email despite its apparent ROI. Email is a relatively cheap
and easy way to generate orders, especially repeat orders. It’s more of an internal discipline as
opposed to one, which is more likely to be outsourced. But with this comes the attitude: ‘it’s
cheap, it’s working, we do it internally, there’s no need to spend any more money on it’.
However our first statistic story above tells us that more time and money does need to be put
into email marketing in order to get subscribers more actively engaged with what they receive,
especially as they’re receiving more emails than ever before.
The decline in the amount of
budget assignedto email versus
last year.
3. challenges which inhibit a successful email campaign...
While these aren’t the biggest inhibiting factors (limited internal resource is still number 1,
but in decline), we think they show an interesting trend; a desire by marketers to move
towards more relevant targeted engaging emails enabled by great data and content. Data
degradation can be solved by having solid data integration, management and segmentation
systems linking directly with an ESP. Content is more of a challenge. Defaulting to discounts
when pressed for inspiration isn’t great, but happens a lot. Planning a mix of editorial, sales,
feedback and triggered content is time well spent in our book.
So what ?
source: adestra email survey
source: Direct Marketing Association
29%
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of email marketers of
us say a data
degradation inhibits a
successful campaign.
Up from 3% two
years ago.
The percentage point
decline in ‘never
active’ email
subscribers within the
retail sector over the
past two years.
19%
'Never Active' subscribers
'Active' but over one year ago
2013 2015
0
50
100
25% -19%
of email marketers
say a lack of content
holds us back. Up
from 13% two years
ago.