Audience engagement with email marketing has reached record high

Audience engagement with email marketing increased to unprecedented levels in 2016, with click-through rates rising from 3.4% to a record 4.2% and click-to-open rates increasing from 10.9% to 11.9%, according to a new report from Sign-Up.to.

The 2017 Email Marketing Benchmark Report, which analysed over 1.5 billion emails from January 1 to December 31 2016, also found that average open rates have remained stable at around 25%, maintaining a high that has lasted for the past five years.

Meanwhile, unsubscribe rates continued on what has been a three-year decrease, falling from 0.52% to 0.49% over 2016.

The findings highlight the need for start-ups and small businesses owners to adopt email marketing in their advertising strategy, with the report having highlighted two “key drivers” to increase audience engagement:

Mobile optimisation – The report found that around half of emails opened were via a mobile device.

Automated one-to-one emails – Such as ‘welcome’ messages, were found to encourage engagement, with such emails outperforming multi-subscriber campaigns in average open rate.

Commenting on the “encouraging” figures revealed by the report, Tony Kent, marketing manager at Sign-Up.to, said:

“The use of mobile responsive email design and an increase in profiling and personalisation techniques are key drivers of this, allowing marketers to better target their campaigns to the needs of their audience.”