With the rise of smartphones and tablets, the formatting of our email marketing campaigns are more important than ever. According to a 2015 SmartInsights report, 46% of all emails are now opened on either a smartphone (34%) or tablet (12%). These numbers could be even higher in the B2B and B2C marketing space, where it can be reasonably assumed that sophisticated buyers are using mobile devices to consume emails at a higher rate. There are other reports that estimate mobile and tablet opens to be as high as 66% of all email opens!
Let’s consider 3 stats from the SmartInsights report:
What does this mean for marketers?
What this means is that 27% of OPENED marketing emails will be viewed on a screen ranging from 3.5” to 5.5” assuming most users have an iPhone 3g or later. This number jumps to 34% when you add Android devices which have generally similar screen sizes. When you add iPads into the equation you are looking at 46% of your emails being opened on a screen that is 3.5” to 9.7” in size.
Why is this important?
Considering that 34% of every email marketing campaign you send will be opened and viewed on a screen that is 3.5” to 5.5”, if your message is not optimized for mobile views, you are instantly failing to engage or capture one third of all your opens. Email marketing is a highly efficient and powerful tool, but neglecting to consider our mobile audience greatly reduces its effectiveness.
What can we do?
As marketers, it is critically important to understand the mediums our target audience is using to digest our marketing messages and ads. Smartphones and tablets have become more prominent than traditional desktop computers so it is critical that we format our email marketing campaigns to adjust for this shift. Here are 3 ideas to help format your email marketing campaigns for smartphone and tablet opens:
When formatting your email marketing campaigns in 2015, remember that smartphone and tablet opens are poised to exceed desktop opens (if they do not already) and we must account for this shift in consumption by our audience. Failing to optimize our email formatting could result in our message being lost on up to 50% of our opened emails and as marketers we simply cannot afford to miss half our audience.
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Aaron Hockel is a Partner and the VP of Digital Marketing at AltaVista Strategic Partners. A University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) alumnus, Aaron expertly crafts digital marketing strategies that drive success for clients, leveraging his deep industry knowledge and innovative approach.