As marketers working in retail gear up for his or her most vital time of 12 months, email campaigns are central to their strategy. However, despite all the planning and crafting of email messages, 31% of consumers delete emails inside seconds, basing their decision on the subject line, according to data from Validity.
The issue of quick deletions is particularly prevalent amongst Millennials and Gen Z.
The sheer volume of email is a component of the problem. Validity says global email volumes (for legitimate, permission-based emails) have doubled since the starting of the COVID pandemic in early 2020, when brands were throwing the whole lot they’d at digital channels. But when the pandemic faded, the emails didn’t.
To say that younger generations are turning away from email in favor of other channels isn’t entirely accurate. The demographics of email use and engagement are much more complicated.
“Even the younger generations still engage positively with email,” Guy Hanson, VP of customer engagement at Validity, told MarTech. In fact, people engage more with email as they become older. Hanson said that their education and income all influence their channel preferences.
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“Relative to other channels, email is losing traction in terms of recognition, and that’s mostly due to Gen Z,” Sophie Cheng, SVP of product marketing at Sinch, told MarTech.
Sinch’s research found that customers’ preference for email is down 5.5% this 12 months, while WhatsApp use is up 5.1%. That’s probably not surprising because younger generations often adopt recent technology and, with it, recent preferences.
But what’s surprising is that two cornerstones of retail marketing are also losing popularity with consumers. The demand for multichannel experiences is down nearly 7%, while one in six consumers feels personalization is invasive.
Complaints about overly personal messages are up 43% from last 12 months, according to data from Sinch. That said, nearly 73% of consumers still want tailored promotions, though that number is down 7.1% from 2024.
Dig deeper: Nearly two-thirds of companies say email deliverability is hurting revenue
Think ‘optimal channel’ as an alternative of ‘omnichannel’
Consumers can engage with brands across several channels, including email, SMS, RCS, WhatsApp, social media platforms, third-party apps like Amazon, and a brand’s mobile apps. That’s plenty of channels for marketers to keep straight, and it leaves plenty of room for individual consumer preference.
Sinch’s Cheng says what consumers really need is control.
“Consumers want selection,” Cheng said. “They want to have the ability to select which channels brands or corporations reach out to them on, and that’s an area where plenty of brands are still behind. They’re not necessarily giving their consumers that selection.”
They also want the experience across channels to be consistent, and that’s one other area where brands struggle, Cheng said. Customers expect brands to carry over the context of conversations amongst channels, from SMS to phone, for instance.
The options for engagement have gotten rather more sophisticated in terms of what customers expect and what brands can deliver. Cheng advises brands to think “optimal channel” as an alternative of “omnichannel.”
Dig deeper: Why syncing email and SMS is critical to marketing success
The brand marketing impact of email marketing
With recent channels seemingly coming online yearly, email might sound to be losing its luster. However, as one among the original digital channels, the way consumers and marketers use email is evolving.
Validity’s Hanson says email is undervalued as a brand-building tactic, one which keeps brands and their products top of mind for consumers. This is in part due to the volume of emails many brands send and in part because — when done well — the emails speak to consumers in the brand’s voice.
Measuring brand is a long-standing challenge for marketers, Hanson said, but once marketers are aware of email’s brand potential, they will search for the right metrics.
“You can have a look at things like, was there a spike in general site traffic?” Hanson said. “Similarly, does search volume increase? Or, for those who sell through a third-party like Amazon, did your Amazon sales spike?”
What’s everyone else doing?
During the holiday season, marketers should consider not only their very own email campaigns but all the other email campaigns vying for consumer attention, especially during the busy Black Friday-Cyber Monday weekend.
One advice to improve email deliverability and inbox placement is to schedule bulk emails for any time aside from the top of the hour, when email providers are bombarded by messages (as are consumers). Sending an email quarter-hour past the hour or 10 minutes to the hour could make a difference.
Dig deeper: ‘They did it, so we must always too’ isn’t an email strategy
Regardless of when emails exit, consumers will see plenty of email subject lines in that short time period between Black Friday and Cyber Monday, and listed here are Hanson’s suggestions:
- Don’t be too clever with subject lines. Front-load the offers in order that they’re seen.
- Put emojis at the front of subject lines for impact and to avoid being truncated.
- Personalize by interest if the data is trustworthy, with subject lines that say things like, “Golfers such as you…”
- Don’t rely 100% on AI for email subject lines.
To that last point, Hanson said: “I believe plenty of senders at the moment are using AI to help them with their subject lines and, as a productivity tool, I believe that’s right. But I might also suggest, don’t rely 100% on AI. Let it provide you with the initial ideas after which use the human touch to tweak them.”
He said AI often recommends using highly urgent terms in subject lines which might be on the verge of clickbait.
“Actually, you wish to be sure that you’re using brand-centric color language and people specific phrases that your customer associates with the business,” he said. “And AI doesn’t know all of that — yet.”
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