50 Email Marketing Stats for 2021

Email marketing has been around for a good while. In fact, the first email marketing blast was sent in 1978 to 400 recipients- resulting in $13 million in sales!

While technology has come a long way since the ’70s, email marketing hasn’t gone anywhere. There’s no browsing the internet without being asked to sign up for a newsletter in exchange for something, whether that’s a discount, a free course, or one of the many other options.

The reason businesses are so keen to capture the emails of their visitors is because it works and can provide a lot of value from a relatively small investment. 

But it’s also important to understand what recipients expect from marketing emails– failing to do so will result in high unsubscribe rates and low engagement. By taking a look at email marketing stats, you can begin to scratch the surface of what works and what your customers actually want to hear from you about.

But don’t take my word that it works, check out our list of 50 emailing marketing stats for 2020 to see for yourself:

1. Timing is everything- 21% of emails get opened within the first hour of being sent

2. Europe is the continent with the highest open rate, at almost 27%

3. Both the UK and US have average open rates of 18.39%

4. 80% of business professionals claim email marketing improves customer retention

5. Sending customers 3 abandoned cart emails is better than 1, generating 69% more purchases

6. 87% of marketers use email to distribute content organically 

7. The non-profit sector has the highest open rate for emails at 36.15%

8. 73% of millennials prefer business correspondence through email

9. Video works- including it can increase click-through by 300%

10. 81% of SMEs rely on email as their main acquisition channel

11. Give your emails a personalised touch to get a 50% better open rate

12. 99% of consumers use their email account every day 

13. Emails with images have an 8% higher open rate

14. 90% of marketers track email engagement to measure performance 

15. Take advantage of your welcome emails – the average open rate is 82%

16. Almost 60% of marketers claim email is their largest ROI

17. 46% of emails are opened using a phone

18. Across home, work and mobile, people check their email 20 times a day

19. 31% of people say that email is the highest-performing way to nurture leads

20. Engagement is on the up over the past 12 months, 78% of marketers claim

21. Only 43% of people enter a genuine email into websites that require one to continue

22. 42.3% of people will delete a marketing email if it’s not mobile-optimised

23. Emails about hobbies have the highest overall open rate (27.74% OR)

24. 23% of brands have uses interactive elements in their email campaigns

25. Germany has the highest email open rate in Europe, with an average of 40% 

26. 59% of people claim that email marketing influences what they buy 

27. Including the contact’s name on the subject line can increase open rates by 18.3%

28. 64% of people will open an email if they trust the brand sending it

29. Across all industries, the average open rate is 21.33%

30. The average click rate across all industries is 2.62%

31. 64% of B2B companies use a dedicated email marketing platform

32. 40% of B2Bs say newsletters are their most important marketing strategy

33. Social share buttons can improve the click-through rate by 158%

34. 66% of users unsubscribe if emails aren’t relevant 

35. Using A/B testing your emails can bring in 37% higher returns

36. 27% of marketers don’t think their email marketing is integrated well into other channels

37. 72% of users get promotional content via email

38. Women spend 7 minutes longer a month checking their emails

39. Overall, men open almost 3% more emails than women do 

40. 74% of consumers want to receive gender-neutral marketing messages

41. 94% of small businesses write their own email copy 

42. The average email deliverability is 79.6%

43. Saturdays and Wednesdays have the worst click-through rate of the week, at 2.5% 

44. Tuesdays have the highest open rates, at 18.3%

45. iPhone devices have the highest conversion rate, 38.21%

46. 75% of Gmail users access their account through their smartphone

47. More than 50% of people think humour is ok in marketing emails 

48. 65% of small business average open rates between 11% – 50%

49. There are expected to be 4.3 billion email users by 2023

50. As many as 70% of brands do not track their email marketing ROI effectively

And that’s it! I hope you find these email marketing stats interesting and useful. If you need help with your business’s email marketing, you can keep up with the latest email marketing trends with our article here, or contact us here.