Email marketing 'to dominate during recession'

11:55 16th March 2009

Email-based marketing is continuing to prove popular during the ongoing economic downturn due to its strong return on investment, an expert suggests.

Eric Groves, senior vice president of global market development at Constant Contact, said that the benefits of email marketing will always be apparent to companies.

Mr Groves explained that "businesses have recognised email marketing for its core strength, which is building relationships and trust with people that you already have some form of connection with".

"The challenging economic climate has caused businesses to pick their heads up and evaluate the effectiveness of all of their spend and it turns out that email marketing is the most cost-effective way to generate repeat business," he added.

According to the National Email Benchmarking Report for the second quarter of last year, more marketers opted to run retention email marketing campaigns rather than acquisition.

The research revealed that 82 per cent of such marketing drives were aimed at retaining customers while just 18 per cent were designed to acquire new clients.