Retailers concerned about how spam affects their e-mail marketing programs ain’t seen nothing yet, says new research from Gartner Inc. The research, contained in Gartner’s "Marketers Can Differentiate E-Mail From Spam” paper, shows that spam accounts for 50% of e-mail today, confirming others’ recent research, and projects that it will account for 60% of all e-mail next year.
By 2005, Gartner projects, content managers, rule-based software and Internet service providers will blacklist 80% of all e-mail marketing campaigns, including permission-based e-mail.
Gartner says that today’s pressures to achieve cost benefits outweigh the effort of making sure e-mail contains messages the customers want to receive. "Before customers ignore this valuable medium, marketers must start again by clearly identifying their customer base, surveying their customers as to the types of e-mail they would like to receive, and then deliver on the feedback and give customers a way to update their preferences frequently," said Adam Sarner, industry analyst for Gartner.
However, Gartner reports, when used efficiently, e-mail marketing is an effective communication tool. A well-crafted e-mail can receive as high as a 15% response rate, compared with less than 1% for banner ads, according to Gartner analysis. Moreover, a company can collect real-time information about its customers and use the data to anticipate customer needs, Gartner says.
"Because e-mail can be effective and is less expensive than traditional marketing methods, by the end of 2004 more than 80% of companies engaged in direct marketing will conduct at least one e-mail marketing campaign," said Sarner. "It is thus imperative that marketers start now to differentiate their e-mail campaigns from spam by focusing on communication, personalization and delivery expertise."
Back...
