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One third of NZers open email on a mobile device

Thursday 27 February 2014, 10:20AM

By Touchpoint Group

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How Australians and New Zealanders are reading their emails
How Australians and New Zealanders are reading their emails Credit: Touchpoint Group

If there’s one thing Digital Marketers love, it’s numbers. So what better way to demonstrate the importance of optimising emails for mobile than with a few statistics:

Based on over 43 million emails sent through our platform

• 33% of marketing emails are opened on a mobile deviced
• 68% of emails opened on a mobile device are read on a smartphone, 32% on a tablet
• On average a marketing email is opened 1.8 times – often on different platforms
• 8% of opened marketing emails are forwarded on to other people

Optimising marketing emails for mobile is essential. Here are our Top 10 tips for ensuring yours make the mobile grade.

  1. Include Share buttons:  people like to share good content or information with their friends and the rise of social media has not only made sharing more common, it’s made it quicker and easier to share with a much wider group of people. Adding social sharing buttons to each section of an email newsletter makes it more likely that your content will be shared beyond your existing email list.
  2. Get to the point: last year 22% of marketing emails sent were opened on a smartphone and it’s likely this will increase significantly in 2014. Keeping your messages shorter and more concise makes them easier to read on a smaller screen.
  3. Minimise the need to zoom: make sure the font size you use is big enough to be read on a small screen, and that any detailed text that needs to be small can be easily expanded and swiped back into place again.
  4. Use Images considerately: images make content more engaging but if not used thoughtfully can lead to a bad user experience. Ensure any images you use are small enough to load quickly so they aren’t an issue for people on smaller data plans.
  5. Reduce the need to scroll: when loading images make sure you define them as a proportion of the screen - rather than in pixels – and set the height to ‘auto’. That way the image will automatically adjust to fit the size of screen the email is opened on and you won’t frustrate your customers by making them swipe and scroll to see your content.
  6. Use buttons rather than text links: not only are buttons more eye-catching, they are also easier to “click” with a thumb on a mobile device. A study by MIT determined the average size of an adult index finger is 1.6-2cm – which works out at 45-57 pixels. Based on this, it makes sense to ensure any CTA buttons in your email newsletters are at least this size to make them “fat-thumb friendly”.
  7. Check for download cutoff sizes: A quick audit of your database will give you an idea of which email apps are most popular. It pays to double check the specs to see if there is a download cutoff – if there is it could mean your users are seeing a page full of image holders instead of your content.
  8. Focus on your first paragraph: Most email apps on mobile devices pull in the headline plus the first 80 characters of text it finds. Make those first 80 characters count by treating them as part of your headline.
  9. Create a template: Incorporating all of the above into your own responsive design template is well worth the effort – it can take a bit of time at first but will make things much quicker and easier in the long run.
  10. Optimise your landing page for Mobile too: Standard websites can be extremely frustrating to use on smaller mobile devices such as a smartphone. If you’re taking the time to optimise your emails for mobile, then make sure you continue this improved user experience through to your website.

Ensuring your emails are optimised for mobile was once a nice to have, but in 2014 those that don’t make the effort will be punished by customers who simply can’t be bothered with the effort of having to swipe, zoom and scroll to navigate content.

For more information on the products featured in this blog, click on the links below
- Email Marketing
- Website Content Management
- Request a Demo of the Touchpoint Platform

Touchpoint Group is a leading provider of Digital Marketing software in Australasia. For more information about our products and services visit www.touchpointgroup.com.