AI-powered personalization and delivery increased email reach by 35% in 2021: Netcore Cloud’s study of 100 billion emails

Netcore Cloud, a profitable SaaS company and global leader in customer communication, engagement, and retention, today announced the release of its Email Benchmark Report 2022. The report analyzes over 100 billion emails and showcases findings across 22 major industries, including BFSI, Retail & eCommerce, Beauty, Food, Entertainment, and Media. It covers the shifts in email marketing & benchmark metrics since the global pandemic and aims to help marketers strengthen their email strategy in 2022.

Email marketing has prevailed to be one of the most trusted channels for marketing departments to connect and convert customers into loyalists. However, the pandemic and its subsequent challenges have ushered in a new era of email marketing with giant leaps into interactivity, privacy, and multimedia. In recognition of the growing significance of email in modern marketing and the astounding response to its earlier version, Netcore Cloud has released its second edition of its Email Benchmark Report for 2022.

Commenting on the report, Kalpit Jain, Group CEO, Netcore Cloud, said, “In the last two years of the global pandemic, email has become the prominent channel for personalized and conversational marketing. The coming years will see AI-powered tools and interactive emails emerge as the most effective components of customer engagement.

To help brands navigate the widening landscape and master the email channel, Netcore Cloud has released the Email Benchmark Report, 2022. It offers a critical analysis of 100 billion emails sent by our global customers from 20+ major industries. The report presents valuable insights from multiple email metrics that lead to a deep understanding of customer behavior. Brands can now benchmark their email marketing performance against global peers.”

Key Insights from the Email Benchmark Report 2022:

What are the best and worst days to send emails?

Friday is the best day of the week for getting high engagement on campaigns, while the worst day of the week to send a campaign is Sunday. However, this differs from industry to industry. While Sunday seems to be a perfect day to send an email across for MedTech, Monday works best for e-commerce, denoting that people like to kickstart the week by investing in their shopping aspirations. Travel companies make the most of Fridays to offer cheap deals for customers looking for a weekend getaway or short trips.

Which industry has spammed consumers the most?

Online dating and the media over-the-top (OTT) industry has the highest spam complaints, with almost 30 emails every 10000 emails sent. Job portals and the travel industry also feature in the third position with 14 emails getting complaints on Gmail on an average for every 10000 emails sent. Since Gmail is highly sensitive to spam complaints in determining inbox placement, they play a significant role in sustaining deliverability.

The average open rate for emails across industries diminished to 8.7%, possibly due to fatigue built up by continued lockdowns and extended stay-at-home periods. According to Netcore Cloud’s 2020 COVID survey report, 40% of users had stopped checking their emails during the first lockdown. Some sectors like insurance (the highest open rate at 16.2%) and online pharmacy (15.1%) saw strong open rates as people purchased more life insurance and opted for contactless medicine and healthcare equipment during the pandemic. Ecommerce (11.5%) too saw better open rates as volumes of online shopping surged.

Email deliverability rate was the highest for the retail industry at 98.6% followed by the food tech/ food delivery industry at 98%. Foodtech grew positively during 2021 due to intermittent lockdowns and restrictions on social mobility. It has also been observed that entertainment/ media over-the-top (OTT) companies have the lowest deliverability with an average of 77%. A high frequency of emails combined with sending regional content seems to have affected the inbox placement.

The report also highlights the growing adoption of technologies like AI and ML as brands try to enhance their email marketing strategies. It was observed that 49% of Netcore Cloud’s 5000+ clients have adopted AI across audience selection, content optimization, channel preference, and email delivery. Moreover, the report also includes expert opinions on how marketers can tackle the diverse challenges faced. Therefore this report serves as a complete playbook for marketers' every need with regard to Email Marketing and will enable them to maximize the power of emails.

Sharing his views on the study, Rajesh Jain, Founder and MD, Netcore Cloud, said, “Today email has evolved from a personal tool to one that helps businesses connect more meaningfully with their customers. As it offers immense value for solving the attention recession problem, eliminating data poverty, reducing Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC), and providing a pathway to profitable growth, we believe marketers need to prioritize email in the days to come.”

He further added, “Our focus at Netcore Cloud has been to build Email 2.0 and to ‘make email cool again’. Towards this, we partner with our customers to build a strong email marketing strategy that can change customer mindsets from delete to delight, drive engagement and habit creation, and power exponential, forever profitable growth.”

Christopher Mariott, Founder and President, Email Connect said, “Netcore’s Email Benchmark Report 2022 provides unique insights into how the critical email metrics have evolved within two years into the pandemic. It is a wealth of knowledge about advances in AI automation, impact of Apple Mail Privacy Protection, and several email innovations that happened in 2021. A must-read for email marketers of all geographies and industries!”