December 2nd, 2015
It's no secret: email marketing is one of the best digital marketing tactics out there. It yields an average 4,300% return on investment and it's 40 times better at acquiring customers than social media marketing, after all. No wonder why 59% of marketers planned to increase their email marketing budgets this year.
What you may not know, though, is the impact it had on Black Friday. In fact, email marketing drove the most online sales this past Black Friday, accounting for 25.1% of all online orders, according to a Custora report.
This is likely a result of the growing use of mobile technology. Past research has shown that 48% of emails are opened on mobile devices. Meanwhile, according to Custora's report, mobile shopping accounted for 36.1% of online shopping this Black Friday, up from 30.1% in 2014.
Consumers who used mobile devices to shop this Black Friday were most likely to do so using an Apple device. iOS devices accounted for over three-quarters (77.6%) of all orders made on mobile devices. Only 22.1% of mobile purchases were made on Google Android devices, which is not necessarily a bad thing, as only 19.5% of orders last year were made on Google Android devices.
What's interesting is that many people often dismiss email marketing as a valuable tactic. They think that the marketing emails hit people's spam filters and fall to the wayside.
However, this is obviously not the case. This past Black Friday is not the only testament to the power of email. It's just the outcome of what many in the know would expect. Companies nurturing leads through email generate 50% more sales-ready leads and at 33% lower cost. Why, for every $1 spent on email marketing, the average return on investment is $44.25.
The point here is this: email marketing matters. Though you may have doubts and reservations about its efficacy, it works. Plain and simple.