Email marketing budgets are set to rise this year – bucking the trend of most DM channels – with brand owners citing the medium’s impressive ROI as the key driver for growth.
More than half (56%) of the 250 senior B2B and B2C brand marketers surveyed for the DMA Email Marketing Council’s 2013 National Client Email Report, stated that they are “confident that expenditure on email marketing will increase this year”.
The report links email’s prospects to the improving commercial performance of the channel.
According to the respondents polled, email delivered an average ROI of £21.48 for every £1 spend last year – the first time the Client Email Report has published an ROI figure.
Its strong performance is tied to ever-improving and more sophisticated techniques, says the report. Over half of brands surveyed reported an increase in open, click and conversion rates in 2012, a 5% increase compared to 2011 figures.
The value of generic ‘one size fits all’ campaigns continued to decrease, with 75% of email revenue now coming from more targeted approaches. Trigger email campaigns generated 21% of email revenue, despite low volumes sent compared to more general campaigns.
Nine in 10 (89%) respondents declared email to be “important” or “very important” to their organisation. However, in spite of email’s strong commercial performance, respondents expressed concern that the channel’s contribution to their businesses’ bottom lines is failing to earn the recognition it deserves among senior colleagues.
Dela Quist, chair of the DMA Email Marketing Council’s Email Benchmarking Hub and chief executive of the report’ sponsor, Alchemy Worx, said; “The report characterises 2012 as the year where email has defied market trends and carried the load in terms of delivering revenue.
“This is equally true for our clients, who closed 2012 up on budgets and targets for email but down in other channels. The result of these successes, as the report reveals, is that marketers will be investing even more effort in email in 2013.”
In other findings, the report highlights that marketers are still facing major internal barriers to achieving greater email marketing success, with over 25% citing business goals, internal resources, technology and lack of data as their primary obstacles.
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