The document is a research report on email marketing in Ireland in 2011. Some of the key findings from the research include: - 84% of marketers surveyed said email is either 'very important' or 'important' as part of their overall marketing strategy. - The top uses of email marketing are maintaining customer relationships (66%), building brand awareness (46%), and internal communications (53%). - 30% of marketers do not use a dedicated email marketing software and rely on basic email like Outlook. The number using outsourced email solutions increased. - 58% of marketers send email campaigns at least once a month, with 26% sending at least once a month and 18% sending

1. Email Marketing Insight
2011
A research project into Irish marketers’ use of email
Produced by
in conjunction with

2. Contents
Introduction 1
Foreword by Tom Trainor 1
Introduction by Andrew O’Shaughnessy 2
Executive summary 3
About the research 4
Section 1 – Use of email by Irish marketers 7
Importance of email in the marketing strategy 7
What marketers use email for 8
Email systems marketers are using 9
Section 2 – Email targeting and volumes 10
Frequency of email campaigns 10
Email database sizes 11
Use of personalisation in email marketing 12
Section 3 – Email benchmarks 14
Email metrics being tracked 14
Average open rates 16
Average click through rates 17
Section 4 – Email budgets 18
Budgets allocated to email 18
Expected change in expenditure 19
Where email budgets will come from 20
Section 5 - Challenges facing email marketing 21
Future challenges facing email marketing 21
Section 6 - Social media and email marketing 22
Social media and email marketing 22

3. Introduction
Foreword by Tom Trainor
Welcome to the latest edition of Email Marketing Insight, a research project into how
Irish marketers use email.
The last survey gave us many insights in the use of email by Irish marketers. The continuing
commitment of Irish Marketers to email marketing is clear from this year’s survey results. It is
heartening to see that Irish companies are becoming more sophisticated in their email
marketing campaigns and are more focused on measuring the results of each campaign.
The survey this year was conducted along the same lines as the last survey with over 400
marketing professionals from various industry sectors taking part in the research and
answering questions on their use of email, their audiences, email benchmarks and their view
of the challenges for email marketing.
In the analysis of this year’s survey, comparisons are made with the last survey results to
identify trends and changes in practices in the use of email marketing. From this year, we will
also track the use of social media in email marketing campaigns.
This report will give Irish Marketers valuable information about the techniques, trends and
attitudes towards email marketing in Ireland. Hopefully, it will give readers the inspiration to
invigorate their own email marketing strategy.
Wishing you success in your future email marketing campaigns.
Tom Trainor
Chief Executive
The Marketing Institute
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4. Introduction
Introduction by Andrew O’Shaughnessy
We are delighted to once again collaborate with the Marketing Institute on this, the
third Email Marketing Insight report.
The report will be of interest to marketers seeking insight into emerging trends and attitudes
towards email marketing.
Recent research shows that retaining one existing customer is five to seven times more
profitable than attracting one new customer. Email excels at nurturing relationships - and this
fact is reinforced in this survey as the majority of those surveyed say one of the main uses of
email is for customer retention.
Email remains a ‘very important’ or ‘important’ part of the marketing strategy, and this third
report shows continued growth in the use of outsourced solutions to create, deploy and
measure results of email campaigns. This reflects a growing sophistication in the market for
email solutions that will allow marketers to track campaign metrics and build ROI from their
ongoing email communications.
Since the last survey social media has emerged as a must do for marketers. We think social
media is an exciting development and offers a huge opportunity for marketers. However,
many are not sure how to market their products and services in these new channels and are
looking at campaigns as either email or social network. The real power is in social and email
working together. Marketers can use the push power and ‘share-ability’ of email to drive
social networking efforts; and then take advantage of their expanding fan base online to
capture new email subscribers, giving a company the ability to continue communicating on a
one-on-one basis directly in the inbox.
This integrated marketing approach in the digital space is the way forward, and those who
look at how channels can work together will be the ones that succeed.
Andrew O’Shaughnessy
CEO
Newsweaver
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5. Introduction
Executive Summary
In this year’s survey, email marketing remains an essential part of marketers’ marketing mix with over 84% of
Email marketing is increasingly used by marketers to maintain customer relationships, build brand awareness and increase
website traffic. It is also utilised by a large percentage of respondents for internal communications; and as a tool to drive lead
generation and online sales.
In this year’s study, we have included a new section dedicated to the use of social media in email marketing. Interestingly there
is a 50/50 split between respondents who use social media in their email campaigns and those who do not which could suggest
that marketers are still trying to figure out how to integrate social media into their marketing strategies.
When we look at the trend in which email metrics are being tracked and recorded since 2008, we see a lift across the board. As
more marketers look to outsourced solutions for their email marketing needs, they get easy access to these metrics. This allows
them review opens, clicks and depth of engagement through emails, which in turn enables them build true ROI from their email
campaigns.
Some of the other major findings of the 2011 research:
A 12% increase over the 2009 results in the number of respondents sending campaigns “daily”
to “at least once a month”
.
A 10% increase in the number of respondents using email to drive online sales.
A 16% increase in the level of importance B2C placed on email marketing as part of their overall
marketing strategy
There is a 9% increase in the 5,000 – 25,000 database size since the 2009 results.
Links to Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter are the number one use of social media in email
marketing.
As with previous years “inbox overload” and “spam” remain the biggest challenge perceived by
respondents for email marketing, closely followed by “deliverability” and “unwillingness of
people to opt in to new email lists”
.
In both B2B and B2C there is a significant increase in the number of organisations using
outsourced solutions.
48% of marketers do not expect their organisation’s expenditure on email to change in the next
12 months.
The majority of B2C respondents had open rates in the 10-30% rate, while B2B respondents
showed open rates of 31-51+ %.
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6. Results
About the research
This research is now in its third year running and aims to uncover current practices and trends in the use of email marketing in Ireland.
The research was conducted through an online survey sent to over 1800 members of the Marketing Institute.
400 business professionals completed the survey, ranging from sales and marketing executives to company CEOs and owners of
small, medium and large organisations. Respondents represented a cross section of industry types and sizes and included those
working in both B2B and B2C sectors.
Q. What is your job title?
Owner / CEO / Director / MD
19.7%
Marketing / Brand Management 28.3%
5%
Marketing / Brand Executive
Account / Sales Management 19%
27.9%
Other
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7. Results
Q. Which industry sector is your organisation in?
Marketing / Media / Publishing 18.4%
Banking / Finance / Insurance 14.5%
IT / Telecommunications 9.6%
Education / Training 8.5%
Non profit / Trade association 7.1%
Consulting 5.7%
Wholesale / Distribution 5.0%
Hotel / Restaurant 4.6%
Retail 4.3%
Transportation / Travel 4.3%
Manufacturing 3.9%
Entertainment 3.5%
Medical / Healthcare 3.5%
Government 2.8%
Construction 2.1%
Agriculture / Forestry / Fishing 1.4%
Utilities 0.7%
Q. Which of the following best describes your organisation’s marketing audience?
Only businesses 26.1%
Primarily businesses 23.5%
Roughly split between 21.9%
consumers and businesses
Primarily consumers 19%
Only consumers 7.7%
Don’t know 1.6%
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8. Results
Q. How many marketing personnel are there in your organisation?
To help gauge the size of the organisations participating in the research we asked respondents to specify how many marketing staff
they employed. 48% of respondents were from smaller companies with less than two full-time marketing staff. 28% of respondents
were from medium sized companies with 2- 4 full- time marketing staff and 21% were from larger companies with more than five-full
time marketing staff.
1 full-time person 29.1%
2-4 full-time people 28.4%
1 part-time person 18.8%
10+ full-time people 10.4%
5-7 full-time people 5.8%
6-10 full-time people 4.9%
Don’t know 2.6%
The breakdown of companies represented in this 2011 survey shows a significant decrease in the number of full-time staff employed in
medium and larger organisations (5 plus full-time people) and remains the same (Less than 4 full time people) in smaller organisations.
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9. Results
Importance of email in the marketing strategy
Similar to previous years the vast majority of respondents (84%) state that email as part of their marketing strategy is either “very
important” (49%) or “important” (35%).
This is a significant result in that it highlights the critical importance that marketing professionals give to communicating effectively with
their core audiences via email.
Q. How important is email as part of your overall marketing strategy?
Compared with past surveys, there is a major increase (16%) from 71% to 87% of respondents stating that email is “very important”
or “important” in their marketing strategy.
Very important 52%
43%
Important 44%
32%
Neither important or 13%
unimportant
7%
Not important at all 6%
3%
B2C B2B
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10. Results
What marketers use email for
Respondents were asked what they use email marketing for most often in their organisation and answers were summarised below.
Q. Which of the following do you use email marketing for within your organisation?
Maintaining customer relationships 65.7% 29.7% 4.6%
Generating new sales leads 33% 50.9% 16.1%
Driving direct online sales 27.9% 34.9% 37.1%
Building brand awareness 46.2% 39.9% 13.9%
Driving offline sales 23.3% 52.4% 24.3%
Increasing website traffic 42.8% 42.2% 15%
Internal communications 53% 27.4% 19.6%
Always Sometimes Never
As with previous years, a large majority of respondents in the survey always use email for “Maintaining customer relationships” (66%),
“Building brand awareness” (46%), “Internal communications” (53%) and “Increasing website traffic” (23%).
Compared with 2009, we saw a 10% increase in respondents always using email to drive online sales.
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11. Results
Email systems marketers are using
A large proportion of those surveyed (30%) do not use a dedicated email marketing software product and continue to rely on basic
email facilities such as outlook. The figure has dropped 16% from 2009 when the number of respondents using basic email facilities
was at 46%.
Q. What email marketing solution are you currently using?
Normal email such as outlook 29.9%
(no special software or database)
Advanced web-based solution 18.4%
Basic web-based solution 17%
Full service (outsourced to an email 15.3%
service provider)
In-house system (software on your 14.3%
own servers)
Don’t know 5.1%
A closer analysis of the results shows that those working in B2B environments are far more reliant on basic email systems such as
outlook than their counterparts in B2C. In both sectors however there is a significant increase in the number of organisations using
outsourced solutions.
Normal email such as outlook
(no special software or database)
Basic web-based solution
Advanced web-based solution
In-house system (software on your
own servers)
Full service (outsourced to an email
service provider)
Don’t know
5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40%
B2C B2B
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12. Results
Frequency of email campaigns
Respondents were asked how often they conduct email marketing campaigns. The results show that 58% of marketers send email
campaigns at least once a month while 16% of them send campaigns less than once a quarter.
The 2011 results compared to 2009 show a 14% increase in the number of respondents sending email campaigns at least once
a month.
Q. On average, how often do you conduct email marketing campaigns?
At least once a month 26%
At least once a week 17.8%
Less than once a quarter 16.1%
Less than once a month 14.8%
At least once a forthnight 11.5%
We do not use email 5.5%
Don’t know 4.4%
Daily 4.1%
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13. Results
Email database size
Q. What is the approximate size of your email database?
The majority of respondents (56%) have email databases of less than 5000 addresses
<5000 email addresses 56.4%
5000-25000 email adresses 24.9%
25000-100000 8.9%
Don’t know 6.3%
250000+ email addresses 2.3%
100000-250000 1.1%
As would be expected B2B databases are smaller than B2C databases. There is also a large jump in the database size of 5,000 –
25,000 from 16% in 2009 to 25% in 2011..
0-4999
5000-24999
25000-99999
Unknown
250000
100000-24999
20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
B2C B2B
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14. Results
Use of personalisation in email marketing
Personalisation and segmentation are key to getting the most out of email marketing. Anticipated, relevant and timely email campaigns are
likely to yield the best return on investment.
A significant proportion of respondents (72%) do not personalise their email campaigns or only do so by name, an increase from 2009 (64%).
Q. On average, what level of personalisation do you use in your email marketing?
Personalise by name only 39.9%
We do not personalise content 31.6%
Personalise by more than name 14.9%
Use dynamic content (use data to 8%
drive targeted content to specific users)
Don’t know 5.5%
Interestingly, there has been an 8% decrease in the number of respondents who personalise their email campaigns by dynamic
content or by more than name.
Closer analysis of the results also shows that marketers working in the B2B sector tend to use more personalisation in their email
marketing campaigns than those in B2C marketing (67% compared to 58%). This could reflect the fact that B2B marketers do more
retention marketing and have better data profiles on each address.
Personalise by name only
We do not personalise content
Personalise by more than name
Use dynamic content (use data to
drive targeted content to specific users)
Don’t know
10% 20% 30% 40% 50%
B2C B2B
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15. Results
Personalisation in large companies
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
2008 2009 2011
Some None Unknown
Personalisation in medium companies
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
2008 2009 2011
Some None Unknown
Personalisation in small companies
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
2008 2009 2011
Some None Unknown
Large and small companies have maintained the same level of personalisation since 2008. However, we see a notable decrease in the level of
personalisation for medium sized companies. As with the 2009 results, we see that a “lack of customer data” is still a challenge for marketers
with 46% of them agreeing or strongly agreeing to that statement. This could be blamed for the decrease in personalisation for medium
sized companies.
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16. Results
Email metrics being tracked
Compared to 2009 there is a significant increase in the percentage of metrics being tracked by respondents; most notably a 16% increase in
Click-through rates and a 14% increase in bounce rates.
Q. What email metrics do you regularly track?
Click-through rates 59.2%
Open rate 54.1%
Bounce rates 44.3%
Unsubscribe rates 42.4%
Delivery rates 38%
Conversion rates 26.9%
Don’t know 23.7%
Response variations by list segment 12.3%
Further analysis found that those working in B2C marketing tracked more metrics than those in B2B.
Click-through rates
Open rate
Bounce rates
Unsubscribe rates
Delivery rates
Conversion rates
Don’t know
Response variations by list segment
20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
B2B B2C
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17. Results
B2B trend 2011
2009
2008
Open rate
70%
80%
Click through rates Response variations by
50% list segments
40%
30%
20%
10%
Conversion rates 0% Click to open ratio
Delivery rate Unsubscribe rates
Bounce rates
B2C trend 2011
2009
2008
Open rate
70%
80%
Click through rates Response variations by
50% list segments
40%
30%
20%
10%
Conversion rates 0% Click to open ratio
Delivery rate Unsubscribe rates
Bounce rates
As previously stated we have seen a 16% increase since 2009 in the number of respondents using an outsourced email marketing solution. This
would explain the consistent increase in the number of metrics being tracked since 2008 for B2B and B2C.
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18. Results
Average open rates
The 2009 survey showed that 38% of respondents did not know what their open rate was. There has only been a slight improvement this
year with 32% of respondents saying they did not know the open rate of their email campaigns.
Q. On average, what overall open rates do you get from your mailings?
Don’t know 32.8%
21-30% 20.2%
11-20% 13.9%
31-40% 12%
51+% 8.8%
41-50% 6.3%
0-10% 6%
Average Open rates
0-10%
11-20%
21-30%
31-40%
41-50%
51+%
10% 20% 30% 40%
B2B B2C
Analysis also shows that there is an 8% increase in the 21 -30% open rate since 2009 with B2C marketers enjoying much larger open-rates in
this category than their B2B counterparts.However in the 31 - 51% + category, the B2B sector shows greater open rates compared with the
B2C sector.
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19. Results
Average click through rates
Measurement of click-through rates shows a steady improvement in this year’s survey compared to last year. In 2011, we saw a drop in the
percentage of respondents who did not know what their click-through rates were. (36% in 2011, 49% in 2009 and 58% in 2008)
On average, what overall click through rates do you get from your mailings?
Don’t know 35.6%
6-10% 15.4%
3-4% 12.8%
21%+ 12.2%
16-20% 9.6%
11-15% 9.3%
0-2% 5.1%
Average click through rates by industry
0-2%
3-5%
6-10%
11-15%
16-20%
21+%
10% 20% 30% 40%
B2B B2C
Measurement of click-through rates shows a steady improvement in this year’s survey compared to 2009. In the 2011 survey, we saw a drop
in the percentage of respondents who did not know what their click-through rates were, (36% in 2011, 49% in 2009 and 58% in 2008).
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20. Results
Budgets allocated to email
Respondents were asked to describe their email marketing spend. The majority of respondents (48%) spend less than 5% of their marketing
budget on email marketing.
What percentage of your marketing budget do you allocate to email marketing?
0-2% 32.5%
Don’t know 23.7%
3-5% 15.8%
6-10% 12%
11-15% 7.6%
21%+ 5%
16-20% 3.5%
Compared to 2009, there is a slight increase in marketing spend on email marketing, especially in the 6 -15% range. This increase, although
slight suggests that marketers value the importance and effectiveness of email marketing securing a good return on investment despite a
backdrop of tough economic circumstances.
% Marketing spend on email, by year 2011 % Marketing spend by company size
60% 2011 60% Large
2009 Medium
2008 Small
50% 50%
40% 40%
30% 30%
20% 20%
10% 10%
0% 0%
0-2% 3-5% 6-10% 11-15% 16-20% 21%+ 0-2% 3-5% 6-10% 11-15% 16-20% 21%+
Further analysis of the survey results also shows us that both small and large organisations are increasing their marketing spend on email
marketing compared with medium sized organisations who have decreased their spend.
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21. Results
Expected change in expenditure
When asked how their email marketing expenditure would change over the next 12 months, the vast majority (88%) said their expenditure
would either increase (40%) or stay the stay the same (48%). There was also a drop in the number of marketers who said their budget would
decrease which would suggest that despite such touch economic circumstances, marketers trust the ROI potential of email marketing.
How do you expect your organisation’s expenditure on email to change in the
next 12 months?
Stay the same 48%
Increase 39.8%
Don’t know 11%
Decrease 1.3%
2%
11%
Stay the same
Increase
47%
Don’t know
40%
Decrease
60% Large
Medium
Small
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Increase Stay the same Decrease Don’t know
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22. Results
Where email budgets will come from
A large percentage of marketers expect their email marketing budget increase to come from “New budget” (17%), followed by “Print/press
advertising budget” (16%) and “Direct mail” (9%).
Where do you expect this increase in budget to come from?
We do not expect our 29.1%
expenditure to increase
Don’t know 21.5%
From new budget 17.3%
From print/press 15.6%
advertising budget
From direct mail budget 8.9%
From TV, radio, cinema budget 3%
From mobile/SMS budget 0.8%
From Door-to-door budget 0.8%
From field marketing budget 0.8%
From inserts budget 0.4%
From outdoor budget 0.4%
From interactive TV budget 0%
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23. Results
Future challenges facing email marketing
Similar to previous years respondents hold the same opinions regarding the challenges facing email marketing. “Inbox overload” and “spam”
remain the top challenges, closely followed by “deliverability” and “unwillingness of people to opt in to new email lists”
.
Q. Thinking about the challenges currently facing email marketing, please indicate
whether you agree or disagree with the following statements
Strongly agre Agree Neither agree or disagree Disagree Strongly disagree
Recipients' inboxes are swamped and 31.9% 52.4% 10.1% 5.5% 0%
all email suffers
Spam is eroding trust in email 30.9% 43% 14.7% 10.7% 0.7%
Email doesn’t get the attention/ 11.8% 45.7% 31.9% 10.5% 0%
budget it deserves
Deliverability is becoming more difficult 13.6% 48.1% 26.6% 11.4% 0.3%
Unwillingness of people to opt in 15.2% 45.9% 23.8% 15.2% 0%
to new email lists
There is a lack of accountability/ 8.4% 34.1% 26.6% 24.4% 6.5%
measurement
It is difficult to do effective email 11.3% 48.7% 22.7% 16% 1.3%
creative due to image blocking
A lack of customer data is holding 11.5% 34.4% 32.8% 19.7% 1.6%
back email effectiveness
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24. Results
Social media and email marketing
This is the first year this question has been asked and it relates to the increase in social activity seen in both the B2B and B2C sector today. It
is interesting to note that there is almost a 50/50 split between respondents who use social media in their email campaigns and those who
do not.
Q. Do you use social media in your emails?
Yes
49% 51%
No
How social media is used in email marketing
Here respondents were asked which areas of social networking they use in their email marketing campaigns.
Q. If you use social networking in your emails, how do you use it?
We include a link to our Facebook page 81.5%
We include a link to our Twitter page 67.9%
We include a link to our Linkedin paage 44.4%
We include a link to other social 17.9%
network platforms
Readers can share with their 17.3%
Facebook page
We have a subscribe box on 17.3%
our facebook page
We feature a ‘like’ button 16%
Readers can share with their 15.4%
Twitter page
Readers can share with their 9.9%
Linkedin page
Readers can share with other social 8.6%
network plarforms
Analysis shows that the number 1 use of social media in email marketing is to include links to their company Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn
pages.
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25. Thank you
Newsweaver in conjunction with the Marketing Institute of Ireland would like to thank every one who
participated in this years Email Marketing Insight Report.
If you have any questions about the report, please contact
Newsweaver on email info@newsweaver.com
or
The Marketing Institute of Ireland on email info@mii.ie
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