UK retailers focus on personalised e-mails

A Silverpop product story

Edited by the Marketingweek Marketplace editorial team Jun 3, 2010

A study by Silverpop has suggested that UK retailers are looking to improve the results of their online marketing tactics and increase return on investment through carefully designed e-mails.

For the study, Silverpop reviewed the e-mail marketing programmes of the top 100 retailers in the UK.

The findings reveal attempts to rise above growing inbox clutter by offering choices at opt-in and by personalising subject lines.

Among the reviewed UK retailers with e-mail marketing programmes, nearly half presented subscribers with the opportunity to declare preferences during the opt-in process.

This number is 40 per cent greater than in the US, where one third of the top 500 retailers offered subscribers similar options.

In another effort to stand out in the inbox, retailers in the UK were twice as likely as those in the US to grab their recipients' attention with personalised subject lines.

Will Schnabel, vice-president of international markets for Silverpop, said: 'UK retailers are tackling inbox clutter in all the right ways, by focusing on creating the highly relevant and personal e-mails online shoppers crave.

'With consumers exerting more control over their purchasing decisions that ever, giving them what they want is crucial to a campaign's success,' he added.

Other survey data revealed that UK retailers are less likely than US retailers to engage e-mail recipients with sales and discounts.

Only 58 per cent of the top retailers in the UK included incentives in their e-mails, while nearly nine of 10 of the US top 500 catered to shoppers' desires to save money.

In both countries, a relatively small percentage connect their unsubscribe link to a preference centre - a risky move that may be resulting in e-mail lists that are shrinking unnecessarily.

Schnabel said: 'Not everyone who clicks on an unsubscribe link wants to never hear from your company again.

'Some people just want certain aspects of the relationship to change.

'UK retailers are clearly familiar with the effectiveness of preference centres at opt-in and should incorporate them throughout the customer lifecycle, not just at the beginning of the relationship.