Through the years I’ve been asked hundreds of questions on email marketing. A lot of them have been really great, strategic and often hard-to-answer questions.
And then there are those other questions.
You know what I’m talking about, maybe you’ve even asked some of them yourself, like these:
- What is the average email open or click-through rate?
- What is the best time to send emails?
- What is the best or optimum email frequency?
Ugh. Simply put, there are no truly meaningful answers for these questions, but more importantly they sim
ply are the wrong questions to ask. Instead, better questions to ask (respectively from above) might be:
- What are our revenue or other business goals and therefore what email process metrics are required to achieve these goals?
- How do we create email programs that add value to the customer relationship and maximize conversions and revenue?
- How do we send more relevant emails, more often but with the same or fewer resources?
Often times it is your boss that is asking these questionable questions, e.g., “What is the average this and that rate?” because they want to know how your email program stacks up against others. But whether it is you or your boss, before expending any energy trying to find the answer to a marketing question, make sure you are in fact posing the right question? A question that actually leads you to taking a better course of action.
Have any horror stories of chasing after answers to non-strategic questions your boss or someone else has asked? Please share below.
Good point Loren, I’m not a big fan of the aggregate view on comparative averages either. It’s like asking “What’s the best speed/avg speed to drive on the interstate?”
Me: “Well, there’s a ton of variables that will dictate how fast you should drive. The guy in the Ferrari has different variables, obviously.”
My absolute favorite to hate is what you’ve already pointed out – Avg open/clicks. That’s not something that you can average. There are too many things to consider to apply an average to emails as a whole: industry, b2b, b2c, product, service, customer base, demographics, subject lines, list health, content, etc. The health of a list can dilute statistics and cause reporting issues. It’s really a matter of historical improvement within the company. Acquire data on older sends, analyze and improve based on what you have. Too often we get caught up with the Jones’ and don’t focus on our own tasks at hand.
Viva la email.
One of my favs is “Why are so many people unsubscribing from my list?”. The only answer involves explaining to the client why they’re doing email all wrong and that they should have been listening to our advice in the first place. Once they’ve unsubscribed, it’s too late.
Rory – completely agree. I’ve written several columns on the problems with using average as a benchmark – including this Email Insider post – Benchmarking: ‘Average’ is the New Bottom – http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?art_aid=119294&fa=Articles.showArticle
Peter – That’s a great one. Uh, perhaps they are unsubscribing because they don’t find your emails relevant or valuable??? Dare I guess that a lot of the peeps asking that question are used to working in channels that don’t have a direct feedback mechanism?
Thanks for joining the conversation guys – appreciate it.
Mahalo
I guess those questions are indeed not the best questions to ask, but it’s a start! Someone who is asking about average openrates is thinking about their open / click rate and wants to know how they could do better. So that is already a first step.
I think these questions are already a lot better and can lead to a real change of thought in measuring, testing & optimization.
* What is my average email open or click-through rate?
* What is the best time to send emails for me?
* What is the best or optimum email frequency for me?
Why are you delivering my email to the junk folder?
Jordie – I agree those types of questions are a start, but I’m not sure I agree they are a “good” start. If your point is that at least the marketer is asking SOME questions, then I agree.
But my point is simply that too many marketers and email marketers are looking for the simple answer – e.g., is Tuesday at 10 am the best time to send email or ok, sending email 4 times per month is about the right frequency.
By asking and accepting those kinds of questions/answers the marketer in fact isn’t likely to move their program forward much, because they’ve probably made the wrong assumptions.
But to your point, putting my crabbiness behind, keep those questions coming.
Loren – I think that with the right question begins the route to get a real answer. Step by step. If the marketeer can ask, for instance: “What is the right frequency for me?”. He will need to think more customer centric, maybe start thinking about segmentation, testing, educate himself a bit about emailmarketing, etc, etc.
Actually, we might need to encourage marketeers to ask more questions as a whole. Then we have experts like you guys to help them get the answers. :)
Loren: If we are still hearing these questions, then it’s because we’ve done a poor job of advancing the field. I reference below 2 posts from my blog on this same topic from almost 6 years ago. Simple questions like the ones you mention mean that folks still see email marketing as a single-segment, blast-them-all medium.
Clearly, what we’ve done to date is not working. Our industry has tried actually posting such benchmarks, we’ve tried getting 3rd parties to speak on our behalf about these issues like Forrester, and we’ve tried multiple articles in Mediapost. Yet, at conferences, sessions with “benchmark” data are mobbed, even as we sniff outside and say “come on, that stuff is bunk”; PR pieces mentioning benchmarks get as much ink as celebrity scandals.
I challenge us: what is a better approach than all the same-ol’, same-ol’ we’ve tried for years? What approach will make it so that the post 6 years from reads “Surprisingly, 6 years have passed with no questions about the best time of day to mail….”? And it probably will be more than “relevant, customized emails per person are so easy 6 years from now that folks don’t even think about broad benchmarks anymore”.
My vote: a Broadway play. Preferably one with hummable melodies like “the best click rate is the one you get; the best time of day to send is when you send it”. Ok, I jest. Somewhat. But it’s time to break set, and try something new. What do you guys think?
07/27/2004
http://www.nettakeaway.com/tp/article/92/time-of-day-and-observational-studies
10/19/2004
http://www.nettakeaway.com/tp/article/121/more-research-from-eroi
Michael
[...] asks whether you’re asking the right questions for your email [...]
[...] asks whether you’re asking the right questions for your email [...]
[...] put, some questions are just not worth asking, Loren McDonald of Silverpop recently wrote in a blog post. These include ’What is the average e-mail open or click-through rate?’ [...]
GR8 one Kent – yes it is a plot by the TriLateral Commission…intentionally just targeting “them.” We’ve done nothing wrong, are in compliance with the regulations – who are these people filtering our valuable, relevant and wanted emails? :-)
I meant to say “Competitive Averages” #FAIL