Global Email Benchmark Report
TABLE OF CONTENTS 3
Motivation
4
Methodology
4
Data Collection
5
Determine Your Email Engagement Health
23
Engagement Benchmark Highlights
24
How and Where is Email Being Consumed?
25
Demographic/Geographic/Device Highlights
26
7 Ways to Empower Yourself
27
Appendix: Metrics Definitions
29
Resources
ABOUT THE AUTHORS Aaron is a Data Scientist at SendGrid. He used to be an academic researcher. You can read some of his research papers here. After getting a PhD focused on privacy in social networks and sensor networks he started a location-based advertising company using machine learning and natural language processing. He went on to do research for the Department of Energy, designing distributed data systems for the military and national labs. After coming to SendGrid, he started the Big Data Team and now spends most of his time predicting which emails you will read.
Aaron Beach As a Data Scientist at SendGrid, Victor builds machine learning models to predict engagement and detect abuse in a mailstream that handles over a billion emails per day. After graduating cum laude from Princeton University, he founded an Internet security company and published papers as a bioinformatician in a statistical genetics lab at the University of Florida. Victor holds a PhD in Physical Chemistry from Northwestern University, where he studied quantum confinement and applications of machine learning to small molecule discovery.
Victor Amin © 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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MOTIVATION
As the industry leader in delivering customer communication that drives engagement and growth, SendGrid uses its position and data to measure and publish email-related metrics as benchmarks for email senders globally and in all industries. Our inaugural Global Email Benchmark report, researched and written by our Big Data Team and SendGrid’s email deliverability experts, is intended to help improve your sending strategy and increase the effectiveness of your email program. This report dives into the engagement metrics of email sent through SendGrid which you can use to benchmark against your own program. These benchmarks can help you evaluate your email program and set goals in relation to local and global industry benchmarks. This report also provides information on the demographics and devices commonly associated with recipients of email from particular industries and geographical regions. We’ve also provided insights and actions for you to take if you want to improve on different benchmarks.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Methodology SendGrid collects metadata on all events in the email process, including delivery to the inbox provider, opening of email, and any clicks on links within emails. We use metadata to provide services and information to our customers and to improve our service as a whole. For the benefit of our customers and all email senders, we’ve summarized this data in the aggregate segmented by: 1. Industry of the sender 2. Location of the recipient 3. Gender of the recipient 4. Device used by the recipient Here’s how we analyzed and segmented our data: Industries - We placed senders into different industries based on the type of business they identify with when signing up for an account. Associating email with geography - IP addresses collected from opens and clicks were geolocated using up-to-date databases. Inferring recipient gender - Most email addresses contain a first name. We extracted names from email addresses and cross referenced those names with the U.S. Social Security Administration public names database to infer the gender likelihoods. This method was then normalized against senders with published gender ratios among their recipients. While this method cannot definitively identify the gender of every email address, it is able to estimate the gender breakdown in a recipient population. Detecting recipient devices - SendGrid uses user agent parsing libraries to automatically infer and categorize the hardware and software being used by a recipient when they open or click an email. Determining recipient inbox provider - Recipient inboxes are inferred from the domain in the email address and from the IP address associated with the domain.
Data Collection This benchmark report contains metrics from email sent through SendGrid. These same metrics and methods will be applied to future months and years in subsequent reports to consistently compare changes in email statistics, demographics, and devices in different email regions and industries.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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The data for this analysis came from a representative sample of nearly 30 billion emails from about 100,000 different senders to over 1.5 billion different recipients. Most Internet users in the world are represented in this report in one or more aggregate statistics. This report is primarily representative of business to customer (B2C) email for the countries and industries in which we have significant market penetration. We have included numbers relating SendGrid’s relative email volume in different countries and industries for this reason. *This study may not be representative of personal email.
Determine Your Email Engagement Health This section provides email engagement benchmarks for the industries that send through SendGrid. Each industry has corresponding engagement numbers for the average percentage of male and female recipients, average percentage of email that is opened on mobile and non-mobile devices, average open rate, average click rate, average click-to-open rate, and the average monthly send rate. SendGrid’s in-house email experts have also contributed ways you can use this report to enhance your email program and demonstrate your expertise at your organization. AVERAGE ENGAGEMENT STATS FOR ALL SENDERS Monthly Send Rate
Unique Open Rate
Open Rate
Unique Click Rate
Click Rate
Unique Click/Open
9.8
14.2%
27.3%
1.9%
2.8%
13.6%
The following 10 infographics are presented in alphabetical order and provide the engagement statistics and deliverability advice for the industries that send the most email through SendGrid. While the tips provided can help email programs, they do not guarantee deliverability results because each email program is different, so test out what works best for you. While we see these general themes in our data, they might not match perfectly with your audience.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Career/Job Search 46% Male Recipients
54%
Female Recipients
16.6% 5.1% Open Rate
Click Rate
48% Mobile Devices
52%
Non-Mobile Devices
17.5% 11.9 Click-to-Open Rate
Monthly Send Rate
Advice from SendGrid's Email Experts • The industry average for monthly send rate is 11.9, which is high. If you’re sending at or above this frequency, consider sending less frequently to improve your open rate. Also, establish a sunset policy for non-engagers to keep your list clean and your overall engagement higher. • Consider sending nurture campaigns that help the job seeker with building their resume, interview skills, salary ranges, and anything else that is useful when searching for a job. Sending relevant job matches, not including too many matches per email, and personalizing the subject line and body copy helps too. • A nearly-even split between mobile and non-mobile devices (48% mobile and 52% non-mobile) means you should optimize your messages for all email clients and the most common smartphones and tablets.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Daily Deals/eCoupons 40% 60% 54% Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
46%
Non-Mobile Devices
9.5% 2.4% 13.1% 14.6 Open Rate
Click Rate
Click-to-Open Rate
Monthly Send Rate
Advice from SendGrid's Email Experts • A high monthly send rate means there is less engagement with each email. Consider lowering the frequency of your messages to improve open and click rates or utilizing engagement segmentation to send at higher frequencies to only your most engaged recipients. • Recipients of these emails are more likely to be female, and more likely to be reading messages on a mobile device. Consider optimizing content for this audience. • For better engagement, segment recipients based on recent purchases and use your data to personalize email subject lines and content.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Dating Sites 53% Male Recipients
47%
Female Recipients
57% Mobile Devices
43%
Non-Mobile Devices
18.8% 11.4% 27.4% 14.7 Open Rate
Click Rate
Click-to-Open Rate
Monthly Send Rate
Advice from SendGrid's Email Experts • The average monthly send rate is much higher for Dating Sites than other industries, so consider lowering your send frequency or consolidating daily messages into a weekly digest. • Recipients who open messages are likely to click as well. These consistent engagers should be sent to first to demonstrate to inbox providers that your email is desired and expected. • Provide recipients with a clear way to exit your list if they’re tired of your messages. This lowers the number of unengaged recipients and prevents any false spam designations.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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eCommerce 39% Male Recipients
61%
Female Recipients
59% Mobile Devices
41%
Non-Mobile Devices
12.3% 4.3% 13.9% 18.3 Open Rate
Click Rate
Click-to-Open Rate
Monthly Send Rate
Advice from SendGrid's Email Experts • eCommerce has the highest average monthly send rate, but also the lowest click rate. This could point to recipient email fatigue. Consider testing lowering your monthly send rate to improve click performance. • This industry has predominately female recipients. Utilize segmentation to better target this recipient base and tailor your content and offers accordingly. • Messages are read more on mobile than non-mobile. Keep this in mind when building your templates to ensure they’re easily scrollable and responsive.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Education/Training 46% Male Recipients
54%
Female Recipients
46% Mobile Devices
54%
Non-Mobile Devices
25.5% 7.5% 10.6% 7.4 Open Rate
Click Rate
Click-to-Open Rate
Monthly Send Rate
Advice from SendGrid's Email Experts • This industry has a high average open rate, but few recipients click on links within the messages. Consider testing and optimizing your CTAs and ensure your links are leading recipients to valuable information/offers. • This industry has slightly more non-mobile device recipients, you may consider optimizing messages for the most common desktop inbox providers. • The monthly send rate for Education/Training is lower than average for all industries, but open rate is above average. Consider testing an increase in frequency to see how it affects engagement.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Health/Fitness 38% Male Recipients
62%
Female Recipients
72% Mobile Devices
28%
Non-Mobile Devices
36.6% 10.7% 17.6% 9.6 Open Rate
Click Rate
Click-to-Open Rate
Monthly Send Rate
Advice from SendGrid's Email Experts • This industry has excellent engagement in comparison to other industries. This signals that the email being sent is wanted and anticipated. • Recipients tend to be female. Consider segmenting males and females to provide more targeted content. • Recipients are predominantly engaging with emails on mobile devices. Make sure messages are responsive and optimized for a mobile experience.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Media/Publishing 50% 50% 51% Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
49%
Non-Mobile Devices
19.3% 7.9% 20.3% 4.0 Open Rate
Click Rate
Click-to-Open Rate
Monthly Send Rate
Advice from SendGrid's Email Experts • Messages are read on a fairly even mix of mobile and non-mobile devices, so make sure they look good across all inbox providers and mobile apps. • A lower monthly send rate means there could be an opportunity to test increasing the frequency of your sends without impacting engagement too much. • A low open rate means your content, messaging, and offers may not be resonating with your recipients. Consider testing new copy and design to see if you can re-engage your audience.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Social Media/Networking 47% Male Recipients
53%
Female Recipients
55% Mobile Devices
45%
Non-Mobile Devices
16.6% 5.8% 16.2% 9.9 Open Rate
Click Rate
Click-to-Open Rate
Monthly Send Rate
Advice from SendGrid's Email Experts • Recipients view messages slightly more often on mobile than on non-mobile devices, so you could place more emphasis on mobile-friendly messages. • A lower open rate but an above average click-to-open rate means the recipients interested in these emails are engaging. • Consider identifying the recipients who always click on links within emails and send to them first to improve deliverability.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Technology 47% Male Recipients
53%
Female Recipients
38.6% 7.9% Open Rate
Click Rate
50% 50% Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
8.4% 8.5 Click-to-Open Rate
Monthly Send Rate
Advice from SendGrid's Email Experts • These messages are opened more than many other industries, but are not clicked on very often. Make sure subject lines, content, and CTAs are all working together. • The industry average for monthly send rate is 8.5, which means you could test increasing your frequency if you’re sending less than this. • An even split between mobile and non-mobile devices means your messages should be optimized for all email clients and the most common smartphones and tablets.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Travel/Hospitality 50% 50% 63% Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
37%
Non-Mobile Devices
42.6% 10.2% 12.7% 7.7 Open Rate
Click Rate
Click-to-Open Rate
Monthly Send Rate
Advice from SendGrid's Email Experts • Recipients are more likely to view messages on a mobile device, so make sure your emails feature responsive design and render correctly on the most common devices. • Messages have a high open rate, but a lower click-to-open rate so consider making emails actionable and interesting to drive recipient engagement. • This industry is split evenly between male and female recipients, so make sure messages appeal to as many recipients as possible.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Determine Your Email Engagement Health (continued) The other industries that send email through SendGrid can be found below in alphabetical order. While these industries all send less email by volume, the average engagement statistics can still be used to benchmark your performance against similar senders. APPLICATION DEVELOPMENT Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
Click Rate
41%
59%
55%
46%
35%
10.8% 14.7%
•
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
8.3
Emails from Application Development companies have high open rates, but just average click-to-open rates in comparison to all industries. Consider making calls to action clearer and content more engaging.
•
To improve the average click-to-open rate, consider providing recipients with an email preference center so you can learn how often they prefer to receive messages and what type of messages they want to receive.
•
Mobile devices are over-represented in this industry, so make sure messages are responsive and are reader-friendly on common devices.
AGENCY/CONSULTING Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
44%
56%
57%
43%
23.4% 12.7%
•
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
26.4% 7.1
Few recipients open messages, but those who do often click. You may want to make sure subject lines, content, and calls to action are all clear and work together.
•
With a majority of recipients reading emails on mobile devices, make sure messages are optimized for mobile experiences.
•
The monthly send rate is close to average for all industries. Monitor your engagement to determine if you can test increasing or decreasing your frequency to see improvement.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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ENTERTAINMENT/EVENTS Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
44%
56%
61%
39%
21.1%
8.7%
19.7%
2.9
•
This industry has the lowest monthly send rate of all industries. Combined with a lower open rate, it’s possible recipients may not look out for these messages because there are so few of them. Consider testing an increased send frequency.
•
Mobile devices are also over-represented in this industry, so make sure messages are responsive and are reader-friendly on common devices.
•
Although open rate is low, click-to-open rate is high, which means recipients are interested in engaging further. Continue writing engaging content and providing clear calls to action.
FINANCIAL SERVICES Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
56%
44%
49%
51%
22.5% 6.1%
•
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
13.1%
5.6
This industry, like Politics/Advocacy, has a higher average of male recipients as well as a higher average of non-mobile usage. Consider optimizing email content for this audience.
•
Lower than average frequency, and lower engagement across the board means this industry may not be sending the optimal amount to keep recipients interested. Consider increasing frequency or creating more personalized segments to improve engagement.
•
The low click-to-open rate suggests that few people click on links once emails are open. Make sure calls to action are clear and actionable.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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GAMING Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
52%
48%
42%
58%
15.7%
8%
28.7% 3.3
•
Monthly Send Rate
This industry has more non-mobile recipients than mobile, so consider optimizing emails for desktop reading.
• Few people open these messages, but there is a high click-to-open rate. Consider making changes to subject lines to make them more engaging and interesting to recipients. •
Identify your high and low engagers and segment accordingly. Try sending new offers and content to each segment to see what resonates to help improve open rates.
GOVERNMENT Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
43%
57%
36%
64%
22.6% 7.2%
•
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
15.3%
4.7
This industry has the highest average of non-mobile device usage of all industries. Make sure messages render correctly on all desktop email providers.
•
With engagement levels that are low to average, consider testing new content and ensuring that every email you send provides value to your recipients.
•
To help improve click rate, senders could consider tying content and calls to action back to subject lines.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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INSURANCE Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
46%
55%
50%
50%
5.9%
1.7%
14.3%
4.6
•
There are low engagement statistics across the board for this industry in comparison to all others. Consider working on content and refining calls to action so that recipients are clearly directed back to your app or website.
•
A nearly-even split between mobile and non-mobile devices means your messages should be optimized for all email clients and the most common smartphones and tablets.
•
To improve the overall low engagement, consider providing recipients with an email preference center so you can learn how often they prefer to receive messages and what type of messages they want to receive.
MARKETING/ADVERTISING Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
47%
53%
49%
52%
23.7% 7.7%
•
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
13.5%
4.8
Companies in this industry tend to experience average open rates and low click-to-open rates. Make sure subject lines, content, and calls to action are all interesting and clear.
•
One of the few industries with more non-mobile recipients, so make sure all messages render correctly on common desktop email clients.
•
Recipients skew slightly female. Utilize segmentation to better target this recipient base.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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MOBILE APP Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
37%
63%
57%
43%
56.3% 25.3% 18.7%
•
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
8.2
You may expect Mobile App messages to be engaged with on mobile devices, but these emails are no more likely to be opened on a mobile device than any other industry.
•
Having the highest open rate of all industries means that recipients are eager for these messages. Click-to-open rate is also high, which means these senders could send with higher frequency.
•
This industry has more female recipients than any other industry, so segment your list and personalize content for this audience.
POLITICS/ADVOCACY Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
56%
44%
41%
59%
30.2% 10.5%
•
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
13.1%
9.1
This is one of the few industries that has a higher average of male recipients as well as a higher average of non-mobile usage. Consider optimizing email content for this audience.
•
Many recipients open messages, but they seldom click. Make sure your subject line, content, and calls to action are all engaging and clear.
•
To improve low click-to-open rates, consider providing recipients with an email preference center so you can learn how often they prefer to receive messages and what type of messages they want to receive.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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PROFESSIONAL SERVICES Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
47%
53%
44%
57%
24.8% 8.3%
•
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
19%
4.9
Lower than average frequency and healthy engagement across the board means this industry is sending the right amount to keep recipients interested, but not so much that they’re tired of seeing messages.
•
One of the few industries with more non-mobile recipients, so make sure all messages render correctly on common desktop email clients.
•
Provide recipients with a clear way to exit your list if they’re tired of your messages. This lowers the number of unengaged recipients and prevents any false spam designations.
REAL ESTATE Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
40%
60%
66%
34%
39.5% 18.5%
•
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
24.5% 12
Real estate has a high monthly send rate, but they benefit from high engagement as well. This suggests recipients are eager for real estate emails and will engage with them.
•
Despite having a high monthly send rate, with the correspondingly high engagement, you could consider testing sending more and sacrificing a small amount of engagement.
•
Recipients in this industry are more likely to be female, and the devices are more likely to be mobile. Consider optimizing content for these audiences.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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RELIGIOUS/SPIRITUAL Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
41%
59%
60%
40%
24.5% 5.6%
•
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
10.5%
4.6
Similar to the Education/Training industry, these messages are opened, but not clicked on very often, which means calls to action and content should be refined and recipients should be encouraged to take an action.
• This industry is also more likely to have female recipients and mobile device usage. Messages could be optimized for this audience. • Monthly send rate is fairly low in comparison to all industries, so this could be increased, but keep an eye on engagement stats to make sure they aren’t negatively affected.
RETAIL Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
51%
49%
64%
36%
43.8% 30.4% 30.3% 4.8
•
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
This industry has the highest click-to-open rate of all industries. If you’re not already, segment your messages by demographics and past purchase behavior to up your personalization and ultimately, your engagement.
• Consider providing recipients with an email preference center so you can learn how often they prefer to receive messages and what type of messages they want to receive. • Recipients are more likely to open messages on a mobile device, so make sure messages are responsive and optimized for a mobile experience.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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TELECOMMUNICATIONS Male Recipients
Female Recipients
Mobile Devices
Non-Mobile Devices
Open Rate
Click Rate
Click-toOpen Rate
Monthly Send Rate
45%
55%
58%
42%
14.2%
1.8%
6.5%
3.4
•
One of the lowest monthly send rates for all industries, but also the lowest click rate for all industries. Consider optimizing your content and offers and focus on providing more value to your recipients in each send.
•
To help improve click rate, senders could consider tying content and calls to action back to subject lines.
•
To improve the lower click-to-open rate, consider providing recipients with an email preference center so you can learn how often they prefer to receive messages and what type of messages they want to receive.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Engagement Benchmark Highlights After completing an analysis on the email sent through SendGrid and how it is engaged with by recipients, we discovered some interesting engagement highlights:
Despite high sending frequency, Health and Fitness, Real Estate, and Mobile Apps all have high open and click rates. eCommerce, the industry with the highest average monthly send rate, also has a low click rate. This could be attributed to over-sending and recipient email fatigue. Retail has the highest click-to-open rate. This may signal that recipients want to see more products on the website that they might be interested in, or they could be interested in new product releases and offers. Political and Advocacy emails are opened more often on desktop devices. These emails are often opened, but seldom clicked on.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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How and Where is Email Being Consumed? In addition to gathering email engagement benchmarks, we also looked at how email is being consumed in different countries. Below are the top 25 countries SendGrid customers are sending email to, as well as the top recipient devices and inbox providers in each country. COUNTRY
INBOX PROVIDERS
DEVICES
Argentina
Hotmail
Gmail
Yahooo
Live
Outlook
Windows
Samsung
iPhone
Motorola
LG
Australia
Gmail
Hotmail
BigPond
Yahoo
Live
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
iPad
Macbook
Brazil
Gmail
Hotmail
Yahoo
Outlook
Live
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
Motorola
Macbook
Canada
Gmail
Hotmail
Yahoo
Live
Outlook
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
Macbook
iPad
Chile
Gmail
Hotmail
Yahoo
Live
Outlook
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
Motorola
Macbook
Colombia
Hotmail
Gmail
Yahoo
Outlook
Live
Windows
Samsung
iPhone
Motorola
Macbook
Denmark
Gmail
Hotmail
Live
Yahoo
Outlook
Windows
iPhone
iPad
Macbook
Samsung
France
Gmail
Hotmail
Orange
Yahoo
Wanadoo
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
Macbook
iPad
Germany
GMX
Web
Gmail
T-Online
Yahoo
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
Macbook
iPad
India
Gmail
Yahoo
Hotmail
Outlook
Ymail
Windows
Samsung
iPhone
Motorola
Macbook
Indonesia
Gmail
Yahoo
Hotmail
Ymail
iCloud
Windows
Samsung
iPhone
Macbook
iPad
Italy
Gmail
Hotmail
Libero
Yahoo
Live
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
Macbook
iPad
Japan
Gmail
Yahoo
Web
Hotmail
iCloud
iPhone
Windows
Macbook
iPad
Nexus
Malaysia
Gmail
Yahoo
Hotmail
Live
Ymail
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
iPad
Macbook
Mexico
Hotmail
Gmail
Yahoo
Live
Outlook
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
Macbook
iPad
Netherlands
Gmail
Hotmail
Live
Me
Yahoo
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
iPad
Macbook
New Zealand
Gmail
Hotmail
Yahoo
Live
Outlook
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
Macbook
iPad
Peru
Hotmail
Gmail
Yahoo
Outlook
Live
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
Motorola
LG
Russia
Mail.ru
Yandex
Gmail
iCloud
Yahoo
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
iPad
Macbook
South Africa
Gmail
Yahoo
Hotmail
Web
Live
Windows
Samsung
iPhone
iPad
Macbook
Spain
Gmail
Hotmail
Yahoo
Outlook
MSN
Windows
Samsung
iPhone
iPad
Macbook
Sweden
Hotmail
Gmail
Live
Yahoo
Outlook
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
Macbook
iPad
Taiwan
Gmail
Yahoo
Hotmail
MSN
Me
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
HTC
Macbook
Turkey
Gmail
Hotmail
Yahoo
Outlook
Live
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
LG
Macbook
United Kingdom
Hotmail
Gmail
Yahoo
BTInternet
Live
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
iPad
Macbook
United States
Gmail
Yahoo
Hotmail
AOL
Comcast
Windows
iPhone
Samsung
Macbook
iPad
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Demographic/Geographic/ Device Highlights Some of the interesting takeaways we’ve found after looking at the devices, platforms, and inbox providers that are common in other countries include:
Depending on where you send email, Gmail may not be the most common email client. For instance, if you send email to Russian addresses, you may want to ensure it appears correctly in Mail.ru inboxes. While Windows products dominate most countries, some countries have high usage of other platforms, including Samsung, Windows, Motorola, and Linux. As a global sender, make sure your messages are responsive and appear correctly in all platforms and devices to improve overall engagement. Japan is the only country in the top 25 where iPhone has surpassed Windows for the number of recipients engaging with emails. Hotmail is the third largest inbox provider in the United States, but it moves to the number one spot in the United Kingdom, Mexico, and Sweden. © 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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7 Ways to Empower Yourself This report may highlight successes and illuminate trends you’re currently seeing within your email program, and you may also use it to identify areas for improvement. Here are some ways to use takeaways from this report to your email program’s benefit:
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Opens and Clicks - If you’re exceeding the industry average, arm yourself with this report and show that you’re adding value to your organization by keeping your email program ahead of the rest. If you’re lower than average, dig into why that could be: unengaged recipients, content disconnect, unresponsive emails, etc.
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Personalization - Are there areas for improved personalization and segmentation? Is your industry read predominantly by males (as in Finance) or by females (as in Health/Fitness)?
Mobile Optimization - Don’t forget about mobile devices. As recipients view messages on the go more and more, it’s crucial that your emails are responsive and actionable for recipients looking at them on their smartphones or tablets. Global Optimization - If you’re a global sender, make sure to look at the types of email clients and devices that your recipients in different countries use. Mail.ru, Live, and GMX may not be common inbox providers in the United States, but they’re much more common in Russia, Germany, and Canada.
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Send Frequency - Use our Monthly Send Rate benchmark to optimize the number of times you message customers each month. If you’re sending fewer times each month than the average, there could be an opportunity to message customers more often. Conversely, if you’re sending more than the average, you may want to dial it back a bit to increase engagement.
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Address Collection - Don’t forget about where you collect users. These reports focus on where recipients engage, but it’s worth noting whether your recipients come to you through an app-based/mobile sign up vs. a website. Growing from an app-based relationship with a user to an email-based relationship takes careful attention. Make sure they are aware of the shift both with the email address they are providing (be careful of those old Facebook accounts with possibly no-longer-valid addresses) and that they know what types and frequency of messages will come through after they “sign up.”
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A/B Testing - Keep in mind, these are simply benchmarks for you to consider. What works for
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the majority may not work for you. Every email marketing program is different, and you need to monitor your own sending frequency, opens, clicks, and unsubscribes to maintain your deliverability. Also always ensure that you implement A/B testing before making any changes to your email program.
For more advice on what key tactics can help improve your deliverability, read our Email Deliverability Best Practices Guide.
Appendix: Metrics Definitions Open and Click Rate:
These rates are the ratio between the total number of opens or clicks divided by the total number of emails delivered. These rates include duplicate opens, clicks, and deliveries as they occur.
Gender Ratios:
Inferred using a method described above, these ratios represent an estimate of gender ratios based on the gender rates reported by the Social Security Administration for names which occur in some emails.
Mobile Ratios:
Using the recipient device information inferred using the method described above, devices were categorized as mobile or not mobile. These ratios are the distinct count of mobile/non-mobile devices seen divided by the total distinct count of devices seen. Each device is counted only once per recipient.
Monthly Send Rate
This is an estimate of the average (mean) number of emails received by a
(Send Frequency):
sender’s recipients over the course of a month. It is calculated as the total number of deliveries divided by the distinct/unique number of recipients to which those emails were delivered.
Click-to-Open Rate:
This is the ratio of unique clicks to unique opens; duplicates are not counted. This answers the question: “Of the emails that were opened, what percentage were clicked?” It can be thought of as a proxy for content quality.
SendGrid Volume Share:
Usually calculated by country, this measures what percentage of total SendGrid email volume is sent to recipients in a particular country.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Additional Resources Guides
Email Deliverability Best Practices Guide How To Authentically Grow Your Email List The Expert’s Guide to Email Marketing
Blog Posts
Putting Engagement Data to Use: Sunset Policies Why You Need an Email Preference Center 6 Ways to Stay Relevant to Your Recipients in Your Email Marketing
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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Get Started with SendGrid Learn More Read Our Customer Success Stories Sign Up About SendGrid SendGrid helps you focus on your business without the cost and complexity of owning and maintaining an email infrastructure. We help with all technical details (from whitelabeling to DKIM) and offer world-class deliverability expertise to help your emails reach the inbox. And with a full-featured marketing email service that offers a flexible workflow, powerful list segmentation, and actionable analytics, all of your email needs are met in one simple platform.
© 2016 SendGrid | www.sendgrid.com
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