Consumers Influenced by Marketing E-Mail During Holidays, But Quick to Report Spam According to Return Path Survey
Friday, 20 January 2006
As consumers spent more money on holiday purchases this holiday season, almost half of consumers (49.3 percent) reported that holiday e-mail marketing offers influenced their shopping habits, according to Return Path's Second Annual Holiday Email Consumer Survey.
According to the survey, consumers' experience with a company's e-mail program prior to the holidays was the fastest growing factor in consumers responding to a holiday marketing e-mail – a 17.6 percent increase over last year's survey.
Other highlights from Return Path's Second Annual Holiday Email Consumer Survey:
· Consumers cited their trust and knowledge of an e-mail sender as the top factor (60.6 percent) in opening and reading marketing e-mails.
· 44 percent of consumers reported they received more e-mail than they expected when they registered with a Web site or marketer. Marketers run the risk of overwhelming and exhausting consumers' interest by sending too much e-mail.
· 34 percent of consumers reported marketing e-mails to be spam just because they didn't want it anymore, which hurts companies when their e-mails are then blocked and filtered by ISPs as spam.
· Consumers showed an increase from last year in responding to free shipping offers (5.8 percent increase) and discounts (7.5 percent increase).
Return Path, Inc., a leading e-mail marketing management company, works with more than 1,500 companies to improve the reach, delivery performance and overall success of permission-based e-mail programs.
The Holiday Email Survey was conducted on December 27-31, 2005, using the Survey Direct consumer panel. The survey includes responses from 1814 consumers, ages 18-54, in the US and Canada.
The survey was written and analyzed by Return Path Strategic Services and aimed to understand consumer perceptions and reactions to the use of e-mail by retailers during the 2005 holiday season (defined as the period between Halloween and Christmas). The 2004 Holiday Email Survey was conducted on December 28, 2004, and included 723 respondents, aged 18-54 in the US and Canada.