Report: Email engagement benefits from less send frequency, subject line keywords

Email marketing provider, GetResponse, has released its latest global email marketing benchmarks report, which analyzed over four billion email marketing campaigns sent from 126 countries and spanning 19 industries. GetResponse analyzed emails sent between from January through June 2019.

Why we should care

The report findings detail the effectiveness of different email marketing strategies and campaigns and shares unique insights from email marketers across different industries. Among the findings, subject lines, email volume and time-sensitive offers are among the most effective approaches to engaging email marketing.

Subject lines need to express value. According to the report, the three most effective words also focus on value. “Newsletter,” “PDF,” and “ebook” ranked as the top three keywords for subject lines. The analysis revealed that the average click-to-open-rate for emails including the word “newsletter” in their subject line was 31.43%, including PDF was 30.31% and ebook was 27.84%. We can infer from these results that customers are becoming increasingly open to content that drives them down the marketing funnel.

Fewer emails drive higher engagements. Email marketers who send one newsletter per week see the highest campaign results. According to the report the highest open rates (33.4%), click-through (4.65%) and click-to-open rates (13.91%). Triggered emails, like confirmation emails and welcome emails that contain link to download content had an 88.7% open rate.

Urgency and time-sensitive offers are most effective within the first hour. Time-sensitive promotions and flash sales had open rates of 19% within the first hour of the email landing in the recipients’ inboxes.

“Email continues to be the foundation of an integrated marketing campaign because it provides a low-cost, high ROI channel to engage subscribers that are already primed to hear from you,” said Ola Korczynska, marketing director, GetResponse. “While our latest benchmark report shows what’s currently working in email marketing, it also provides insight into the actions that attract, engage and convert customers using a variety of marketing channels including content, video and landing pages, as well as preferences and customer behaviors around the globe.”

More on the news:

• With GDPR in full affect, more marketers are implementing double-opt ins which drive stronger results. Double opt-ins also serve as a strong security measure for preventing spam traps or sending bad emails to your lists.
• The report analyzed unique values for email open, click and unsubscribes to ensure that each customer action was only counted once.

About The Author

Jennifer Cannon

Jennifer Videtta Cannon serves as Third Door Media's Senior Editor, covering topics from email marketing and analytics to CRM and project management. With over a decade of organizational digital marketing experience, she has overseen digital marketing operations for NHL franchises and held roles at tech companies including Salesforce, advising enterprise marketers on maximizing their martech capabilities. Jennifer formerly organized the Inbound Marketing Summit and holds a certificate in Digital Marketing Analytics from MIT Sloan School of Management.