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March 16, 2006
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The ExactTarget 2005 Response Rate Study summarizes overall open, click-through and unsubscribe rates and provides additional data based on day of week for sending email while examining list size and target audience.
According to the study, open and click-through rates both decrease steadily as list size increases.
The downward trend in open rates by list size stabilizes at between 15 to 20 percent average open rate when reaching 400,000 to 500,000 subscribers. At this point, the audience appears to be of significant size so that adding incremental names to the list does not have an increased negative affect on open rates.
The study also shows that organizations with a B2B focus experienced higher open and click-through rates than their B2C counterparts. This is partially explained by the average size of lists to which these organizations send email. Fifty-two percent of B2B email campaigns were sent to lists of less than 1,000 subscribers, and only 5.6% of B2B campaigns were sent to lists of more than 10,000 subscribers. Compare that with 41% of B2C campaigns sent to lists of more than 10,000 subscribers.
"With larger lists, it is much more difficult to drive significantly higher open rates than normal. This is due to both list fatigue inherent in larger lists and the reality that it is difficult to convey compelling and relevant messages to a large audience through the subject line", says Morgan Stewart, director of strategic services at ExactTarget and author of the study. "The smaller the targeted audience, the better organizations can aim their message directly to their subscribers in their email communications."
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