A newly released study from Return Path examines average inbox placement rate for permissioned, commercial email in the United States and Canada. One of the report’s most interesting findings is that reaching business addresses, which are protected by systems like Postini, Symantec and MessageLabs, is even more difficult than top consumer email providers. According to Return Path, the delivery rate for B2B email sent from January 2009 through June 2009 was about 7 percentage points lower than that of consumer email, and the percentage of B2B emails delivered to the junk/bulk email was nearly double that of consumer emails.
At Silverpop, our team consistently monitors B2B deliverability trends to make sure our clients benefit from higher-than average deliverability rates. In addition, clients can help keep their deliverability high by adhering to these three rules:
1) Don’t send unexpectedly. Make sure you communicate clearly when and how often prospects and customers who sign up to receive emails from you should expect messages. And don’t abuse the privilege by increasing frequency without warning.
2) Make it relevant. Recipients who undervalue your emails are likely to complain and hurt your deliverability, so make sure you create content that’s personalized and highly engaging.
3) Keep things clean. Don’t use lists that are old or have been built with poorly sourced data. Doing so will cause your messages to get caught in spam traps and will hurt your deliverability.
By following these deliverability tips, you’ll help ensure that your carefully crafted B2B marketing messages are reaching prospects and having the desired effect.
