Email Marketers Don’t Always Measure What Counts

EmailStatCenter.com has released results from its “First Annual State of Email Metrics” survey; sponsored by Campaigner, the study measures interactive marketing professionals’ views on email-marketing metrics and the challenges and focus areas for 2008, writes MarketingCharts.

Click-through and deliverability metrics rank tops with email professionals:

• Respondents ranked click-through rate and deliverability the most important metrics to track.
• Metrics surrounding total subscribers and forwards were among the lowest-ranked in terms of importance.

(See chart of marketers’ ranking of email metrics’ importance.)

“While click-throughs and deliverability are essential metrics, it was surprising to find metrics which tie directly to financial return such as ROI, conversion and revenue lower in the rankings,” said Simms Jenkins, founder of EmailStatCenter.com and parent company BrightWave Marketing.

“Marketers are missing an opportunity to use metrics in order to gain the executive support needed to grow their programs. This speaks to the continued need for measuring the impact of email on the complete customer experience.”

Among other highlights of the survey (pdf):

• Frequent measurement is integral to success:
  • Over 95 percent of those surveyed said they measure the results of their email campaigns.
  • When asked how often they measured results, 57 percent of respondents said 24-48 hours after deployment.
  • However, only 18 percent indicated that they measured results on an annual basis (comparing year to year).

• Metrics not ubiquitously used for budgeting:
  • Just 50 percent of the email professionals surveyed reported that they use metrics for budgeting and forecasting.
  • 35 percent of professionals said they do not use metrics for budgeting.
  • The remaining 15 percent were unsure.

Survey respondents also cited list development and time constraints as the biggest challenges they face, and email strategy and measurement as areas for near term focus (see top 3 email-marketing challenges).