2021

State of Email Report
The latest email marketing data & trends

Introduction
It’s an exciting time for email marketing.
The rate at which email volume grows has nearly tripled since the pandemic began.1
Yet, email engagement remains high—if not higher than before—resulting in a
projected $8.49 billion in email marketing revenue worldwide by the end of 2021.2
Nearly 400 marketing professionals around the world weighed in on what’s driving
their email strategies and what they think the future of email looks like. Respondents
included email and marketing specialists, team leads, managers, directors, VPlevel executives, and C-level executives all in the marketing field. Nearly half of
respondents hold leadership positions while 49% are entry-level to senior-level
individual contributors.
Let’s find out what their responses reveal about the state of email marketing today(and how to keep its future bright).

Meet Litmus
Here at Litmus, we’re passionate about email marketing and helping brands
send better emails, faster. We share best practices and trends to help yourteam stay at the forefront of the industry through our blog, Litmus Liveconferences, ebooks, webinars, and more.
Another thing we’re into? Software that makes creating high-performing
emails easy. Marketers pair Litmus with existing ESPs to ensure a consistently
great brand experience for every subscriber, work more efficiently, acceleratecampaign performance, reduce errors, and stay out of the spam folder. With
Litmus by your side, you’ll have the tools and insights you need to provide
your customers with an incredible email experience—and an incredible ROI.

1 Campaign Monitor: 2021 Email Benchmarks Report
2 Statista: E-mail marketing revenue worldwide from 2020 to 2027

2021 State of Email2 / 43

5 monumental shifts about email for today
and beyond
We uncovered several key findings in our survey revealing how marketers use email today, how they’re making
it more effective going forward, and the roadblocks that still present challenges.

Shift #1

Email marketing is increasingly critical to business success.
There’s no question: Email has always been important. But
now? It’s essential.

Shift #2

Personalization and automation are must-haves. While notnew, personalization and automation are no longer nice tohave someday. The time is now.

Shift #3

Privacy measures are forcing strategies to change. Industry
trends to protect privacy are impacting marketing’s ability to
do personalization well.

Shift #4

Brands are looking to agile marketing to meet email
demand. Production cycles are getting longer while volume
is increasing. Burnout is real.

Shift #5

Marketing must embrace the state of the world. Emailprograms are adjusting and even joining the conversations
with world events, tragedies, and changes.

Be at the top of your email game
Join your fellow email marketing pros who rely on Litmus for expert advice and analysis.
Sign up for our emails to get the Litmus newsletter, notifications of new reports andexecutive summaries, announcements of upcoming webinars and events, and more.

Stay on top of email data and trends

2021 State of Email3 / 43

SHIFT 1#

Email marketing is increasingly critical tobusiness successIn a world turned upside down by COVID-19, brands have been forced to either go online for the firsttime or strengthen their already existing digital presence in order to keep their businesses afloat. This
past Black Friday and Cyber Monday alone, foot traffic decreased 52.1%3 compared to 2019 while
online-only shoppers increased by 44%.4
Fueling this digital demand is email.

“Because of the pandemic, much of the in-person interactions and conversions for both B2B andB2C have shifted to digital. Any time digital interactions take place, email is often the orchestrator
and/or byproduct of the experience. While some in-person engagement will return post-pandemic,
consumers are not likely to fall back to their pre-pandemic habits because of the convenience itaffords. This means email has some strong tailwinds as we look to 2022 and beyond.”

April Mullen

Director of Brand and Content Marketing, SparkPost
Co-Founder and Board Member, Women of EmailFollow April on LinkedIn and Twitter

More than 90% of survey respondents say email marketing is at least somewhat critical to the overall
success of their company. 41% say it’s very critical—up nearly 30% since before the pandemic in 2019.

Email marketing is very critical to company success for 30%
more marketers now than before the pandemic.
Tweet this

3 Business Wire: Sensormatic Solutions Releases Black Friday Results From Shopper Insights Traffic Analytics
4 National Retail Federation: Holiday Shoppers Take Advantage of Early, Thanksgiving Weekend Deals

Brands whose email marketing is very
critical to company success

41.5%
39.8%

32.8%

2018

32.2%

2019

2020

2021

This doesn’t mean it wasn’t critical before, but it’s likely the pandemic has made marketers and businesses
more aware of how important email marketing truly is.

“Email should be at the heart of any customer experience strategy. Email is still the number one
touchpoint for reach and relevance with customers and the gateway for customer activation in otherchannels.”

Bruce Swann

Principal Product Marketing Manager, Customer Journey Management, Adobe
Follow Bruce on LinkedIn

2021 State of Email5 / 43

Why the shift?
Email marketing’s essential status can be boiled down to three reasons, as outlined by Tabish Bhimani:“Less cluttered inboxes equals more attention. Basically, someone who has recently
started shopping online and discovering its benefits has an untapped inbox where
your email is not competing for too many eyes. [Editor’s note: On the flip side,
experienced online shoppers have even more emails in their inbox now, making it
critical for marketers to stand out.]
Additionally, our current customers are looking more toward email marketing to help them make up
revenue when ad costs are unfathomably high or swing several times during the week thanks tofirst-party cookie blocking.
Acquisition is still important, yes, but retaining customers and increasing their lifetime value
is where the real dollars are going to come from. Retention has always been a pertinent yet oftoverlooked part of revenue generation thanks to the quick wins that Facebook ads afforded
advertisers. But that’s not what helps businesses scale.”

Tabish Bhimani

Founder and Principal Strategist, Mastrat Digital
Follow Tabish on LinkedIn

As such, email tops the list of most effective channels for marketing, and 79% of marketers put it in their top 3.

Top marketing channels by effectiveness
1.

Email marketing

5. Events

9. TV or radio

2. Paid search/ads

6. Direct mail10. Outdoor media

3. Organic search

7. SMS or push

11. Podcast/voice

4. Social media

8. Video

2021 State of Email6 / 43

Budgets are following suit
Because of email’s growing priority, nearly 37% of companies intend to increase their investment in email
overall in 2022. Only 1.3% plan to decrease their email budget. This is a stark difference from the beginningof the pandemic, when 11% increased budgets and 35% decreased them.

2022 email budget spending plans
Decrease>15%

Decrease0 - 15%

Remainthe same

Increase0 - 15%

Increase>15%

Email marketing overall
0.8% 0.5%

43.1%

29.7%

7.0%

46.9%

22.9%

9.2%

Email team personnel
0.5% 2.4%

Email agencies, consultants, and freelancers
1.9%

4.3%

58.8%

10.2%

1.1%

Email service provider(s)0.8% 3.2%

56.9%

14.8%

5.4%

53.6%

18.3%

3.8%

Non-ESP email tools
0.5% 2.4%

Email education, conferences, training, etc.
1.6%

4.6%

53.9%

15.9%

1.9%

Integration of email with other channels
0.5% 0.8%

43.1%

28.0%

7.8%

Remainder of responses not shown here were marked “Not sure”
2021 State of Email7 / 43

37% of brands are increasing their email budget in 2022, and only 1.3% aremaking cuts. This was nearly the opposite at the start of the pandemic.
Tweet thisWhere are the biggest investments being made next year? Integrating email with other marketing channels andgrowing the email team.
A search of email marketing jobs on Indeed in the United States alone pulls up over 50,000 open roles. And
specialized job boards like EmailJobs.io and Emailtribe.io are booming as great places to post email-related
positions and attract top talent.
And we’ve been saying for some time now: Email marketing shouldn’t live in a silo. It’s nice to see more brands
investing in cross-channel efforts with email, especially since you can very quickly learn from email and apply
what works elsewhere for maximum marketing effectiveness.

“Once again, email has proved just how important it is. Using the channel the right way, however, isessential. I will always fly the flag for email, but we need to protect it. Team it up with other channels
like SMS, WhatsApp, social, and chat for a fully immersive experience. A multi-channel approach will
drive much more engagement and revenue.”

Gavin Laugenie

Global Head of Content, dotdigital
Follow Gavin on LinkedIn

Budget cuts will be almost nil, but if they’re being made, then external email support and training budgets are
first to go. This is likely due to internal teams growing and much of training opportunities like conferences still
remaining largely virtual. Meaning, no travel and lodging expenses to contend with.
But again, those decreases are minimal, and in fact, budgets in those areas (like all areas of email marketing)are much more likely to stay the same or increase.

2021 State of Email8 / 43

Two email cornerstones
Email marketing owes its success to many factors, but two key players are the welcome email and newsletter.
One sets the stage for the entire email marketing program and the other nurtures and retains the subscriber
relationship.
So it’s no surprise they’re the top two emails used by marketers today.

The emails that marketers currently send81%

Newsletter

79%

Welcome75%

Product
Sales or promotions

72%

Event

71%
62%

Onboarding or post-purchase45%

Customer winback
Blog

43%

Subsciber re-engagement

41%
35%

Cart or browse abandonment

31%

Birthday, anniversary, or other milestones

29%

Rating, review, or net promoter score (NPS)

27%

Replenishment or subscriber service reminder
Back in stock or waitlist

14%

But if almost everyone is sending newsletters, how can you make yours stand out? Learn from how wevalidated some newsletter tips and made Litmus Weekly even better and beloved than before. And be sure tocheck out our Ultimate Newsletter Toolkit to breathe new life into your email newsletter program.
Newsletters have become so successful that we’re even seeing a rise in paid newsletters. That’s right, people
are actually paying money to get newsletters with exclusive, original content. Paid writers typically see a 5-10%
conversion rate from their free list, with subscribers willing to pay $5-15 per month.55 Mailchimp Courier: Is this a model for success? Paid newsletters

2021 State of Email9 / 43

Make a great first impression
Welcome emails are the second most popular email sent. Ensure your subscribers
want to come back for more—with these helpful resources:☐ How To Hello: These Are The Welcome Emails You Need
☐ 5 Tips for Creating Great Welcome and Onboarding Emails☐ Live Optimization Notebook: Welcome & Onboarding Emails☐ Webinar Recording: Supercharge Your Onboarding Emails“The email marketer in me is doing a little victory dance here. It’s so gratifying to see more and morebrands recognize the value of email. And while weekly newsletters and welcome emails are a great
start, brands would achieve even more (with very little effort) if they focus on abandoned-cart andpost-purchase emails next.”

Samar Owais

Email Conversion Strategist
Follow Samar on Twitter

Email’s value is clear—but still hard to pinpoint
Though it’s clear email is driving results, exactly how much remains a question. Visibility into return on
investment (ROI) continues to be a struggle. 61% of marketers don’t have a clear view into their email marketing
ROI. And many of those who thought they did, weren’t able to accurately share their ROI.
This may be because of the changing email landscape, growing number of brands new to email marketing,and/or uncertainty of how to even calculate ROI in the first place.
Last year, just a few months into the pandemic, survey respondents were able to confidently tell us theiraverage email marketing ROI was 36:1 (and we dove deeper into what leads to better returns). However, thisyear, there isn’t enough confidence for us to share an updated ROI with you. That being said: Based on email
marketing’s increasing popularity and budget, we wouldn’t be surprised if ROI is much higher than 36:1 today.

2021 State of Email

10 / 43

Knowing ROI requires insight into the following, which you may not have if you don’t manage your company’s
email marketing budget or have a way to accurately track sales growth:•

Revenue from email marketing•

Cost of email marketing tools•

Cost of in-house email team•

Cost of outsourced support

If you do have insight into all of the above, the ROI formula is simple:

ROI =Revenue — Costs
Costs

For example: If in one year, your email marketing drives 10 million dollars in revenue, your ESP costs $100,000,
and you have one email marketing manager with a $100,000 salary, then your formula would look like this:( 10,000,000 - 200,000 ) / 200,000 = 49
Meaning, your email marketing return would be $49 for every $1 spent. In other words, a 4900% ROI.

“Email is a fantastically powerful, flexible, and measurable marketing channel. Leveraging your email
marketing data through actionable reporting is key to making smarter decisions, driving conversions,and maximizing your investments.”

Dr. Ada Y. BarlattFounder and Data Scientist, OperationsAlly
Follow Ada on LinkedIn

2021 State of Email

11 / 43SHIFT 2#

Personalization and automation are direto standing out and scaling
At the heart of email marketing’s boom is personalization. More emails mean more competitionin the inbox, making it harder for marketers to catch their audience’s attention. One way to standout? Personalization. That’s why it’s top of mind for email—55% of marketers are making boosting
personalization a priority for their email program—and all of marketing everywhere.

• 9 in 10 marketers believe personalization is imperative to overall business strategy.6• 80% of customers are more likely to make a purchase from a brand that provides personalized
experiences.7• 83% of customers are willing to share their data to create a more personalized experience.8• 76% of buyers expect more personalized attention from marketers to develop an intimate
relationship with your brand.9“Segmenting your data and personalizing your messages has always been the name of thegame. We all want to feel special as if we are receiving a unique experience from the brands
we choose to share our data with. Asking for and using that relevant data enables us marketers
to deliver that offline one-to-one experience that we all know and love to our customers online.
Not bombarding or overwhelming recipients but being useful, delivering messages at the righttime for each user depending on where they are on their journey with us.”Gavin Laugenie

Global Head of Content, dotdigital
Follow Gavin on LinkedIn

6 Forrester and IBM: Personalization Demystified
7 Epsilon: The power of me: The impact of personalization on marketing performance
8 Accenture: 2018 Personalization Pulse Check
9 Demand Gen Report: 2020 B2B Buyer Behavior Study

Top ways to personalize emails
Here’s how emails are being personalized today.

Top 10 personalization factors used

2021

Name, company name, or other profile data

80%

Customer segment (e.g., prospect or customer)
42%

Location or geolocation

40%

Past purchases or donations

34%

Expressed preferences or interests

33%

Past interactions with products or services

33%

Past website interactions

Gender, race, or other demographics

31%
38%
32%
40%

N/A

23%
14%

39%

30%

26%

Member or reward status or points

72%
49%

64%

Past email interactions

2020

11%

80% of marketers personalize emails with profile data, and
64% personalize by customer segment.
Tweet thisMore brands are personalizing in more ways almost across the board since last year. However, less brands areusing past purchases and past interactions with their website, products, or services as a way to personalize
emails this year. This may be because companies are preparing for life after the loss of third-party cookies(more on that covered in the next section).

2021 State of Email

13 / 43

Personalize beyond first name
There are near endless ways to personalize emails. Ensure you deliver relevant—but not creepy—
content with these helpful resources:☐ The Secrets to Really Good Email Personalization☐ Building Relationships With Personalized Emails☐ Using Data to Drive Personalized Email Templates

It’s great to see marketers eager to get more from their email programs through personalization—along with astronger set of data to allow for that. 35% of marketers are prioritizing enriching their customer profiles.

“I hope that with the changing privacy landscape, more brands will lean into transparency on how
data is used and will be more forthcoming in asking for customers to tell them what they want.
Tactics like progressive profiling done in creative and interactive ways will go a long way in data
gathering and also understanding who your active subscribers are once opens disappear for aroundhalf of all email subscribers.”

April Mullen

Director of Brand and Content Marketing, SparkPost
Co-Founder and Board Member, Women of EmailFollow April on LinkedIn and Twitter“A robust customer profile continuously updated with preferences, first-party data,and permission-based data is the key ingredient to a digital strategy. It fuels an
understanding of the customer and anticipating what they are likely to do next.”

Bruce Swann

Principal Product Marketing Manager, Customer Journey Management, Adobe
Follow Bruce on LinkedIn

2021 State of Email

14 / 43

“Robust subscriber profiles that merge together past actions, purchases, and form responses are atreasure trove!
I love analyzing subscriber data to find commonalities and patterns. These powerful insights help
craft personalized campaigns and automations that drive conversions.
If you haven’t started yet, now is a great time to audit your existing subscriber profiles, merge theinformation you have across data sources, and identify new first-party data to collect.”

Dr. Ada Y. BarlattFounder and Data Scientist, OperationsAlly
Follow Ada on LinkedIn

Segmentation drives personalization
With all the data available to marketers, they’re creating more email versions to target content to different
audiences within the same email. As personalization and segmentation continue to drive optimization, the needfor additional versions of emails goes up significantly.
More than 65% of marketers are creating at least 2 versions of an email on average. Nearly 16% are creating 4
or more.

49.3%

Number of different versions
created for a single email

31.0%

8.6%

1

Version2021 State of Email

2-3

Versions

4-6

Versions

3.5%

3.8%

7-9

10+

Versions

Versions

15 / 43

“Conditional content is becoming more important. And this content has to provide value. For
example, we now show a customer’s points balance in every email if they have accumulated them. If
not, we conditionally show them a module that encourages them to sign up.
Some customers have taken a quiz that allows us to segment better for our clients. But we will hide
those quiz modules for those that recently took them.
By the same token, for someone who has not subscribed to a subscription product, we show
conditional modules to encourage them to do so by leaning into the benefits in the copy. If they’realready on a subscription, we give them the option to manage their subscription instead.”

Tabish Bhimani

Founder and Principal Strategist, Mastrat Digital
Follow Tabish on LinkedIn

We’re not going to lie: Personalizing emails per audience segment can take a lot of work. While it pays off, you’ll
need to balance the time and effort for personalization with your team’s priorities and level of resources.

Get to know subscribers with A/B testing
Another way to learn more about your subscribers so you can create more personalized, optimized experiences?
A/B testing. But, this is harder to pull off than it seems, with 55% of marketers rarely or never A/B testing.

How often does yourcompany typically A/B or
multivariate test emails?

44%

23%
15%

11%

4%
Always2021 State of Email

Often

Sometimes

RarelyNever
16 / 43

55% of marketers are missing out by rarely or never A/B testing.
Tweet thisWhy aren’t marketers A/B testing more often? With changing demographics in fast-growing email lists, A/B
testing has been especially challenging. Who you think your subscribers are and what you think they want
could change in days. And with smaller lists, statistical significance has been all but impossible to achieve.
So if you want to make a difference, you’ve got to swing big. Test more significant changes rather thansubtle differences.

“Take advantage of subscriber personalization in your email campaigns, even if all you have istheir first name. Don’t think it works? Run an A/B test with your subscribers, with and without
personalization, then look at your analytics to see how subscribers engage with both emails. Also,
don’t limit personalization only to the subject line; add personalization to your email copy as well.”Ali Fuller, CPACC

Marketing Automation Manager, Fiveable
Follow Ali on Twitter and LinkedIn

A/B test your way to success
Here are some helpful resources to get you started on the right foot:☐ How to Set Yourself Up For A/B Testing Success☐ How to Do Email A/B Testing Right (+ 10 Easy Ideas to Start Now)
☐ How the World’s Best Email Brands Run A/B Tests☐ 13 Email A/B Testing Mistakes that Limit Your Success

2021 State of Email17 / 43

Welcome
Product
Sales or promotions

Scale personalization with
automation
Event
Onboarding andor post-purchase
In an effort to personalize
scale, automation and artificial intelligence (AI) is going to become evermore

critical to an efficient and effective email program. About 59% of marketers have made expanding automation
Customer winbacka priority for their email program. Why? It’s all about pursuing sending the right content to the right audience at
Blog

the right time.

Subsciber re-engagement
Rating, review, or net promoter score (NPS)The top priority for email marketing programs is automation.

Cart or browse abondonment

Tweet thisBirthday, anniversary, or other milestones
Replenishment or subscriber service reminder

79% of respondents saiduse
Of those, over half use it for triggered emails, drip or nurture
Backtheyin stockor automation.
waitlist
campaigns, and segmentation.

How automation is used in email marketing
Triggered emails

82%

Drip or nurture campaigns

67%

Segmentation

56%

A/B testing

45%

Reporting

32%

Email content

27%

List verification and hygiene

25%

Contact management

19%

Email development
QA testing2021 State of Email12%7%18 / 43

“For smaller businesses that can’t afford to spend a significant amount on email marketing,automations will become key to doing more with less. But even our big clients have scaled primarily
due to the function that automations serve.”

Tabish Bhimani

Founder and Principal Strategist, Mastrat Digital
Follow Tabish on LinkedIn

Taking a closer look at emails that are automated, the most popular to automate are the welcome series,
onboarding or post-purchase emails, and subscriber re-engagement.

Emails, journeys, or sequences that are automatedWelcome83%

Onboarding or post-purchase

68%

Subscriber re-engagement

40%

Cart or browse abandonment

38%

Customer reactivation or winback

35%

Birthday, anniversary, or other milestones

34%

Rating, review, or net promoter score (NPS)

28%

Replenishment or subscription service reminder
Back in stock or waitlist

2021 State of Email

23%
10%

19 / 43

“Yes (or rather Yasss) to all of this! And while losing access to certain metrics might feel like a big
deal, brands can get around that by focusing on mapping out their subscribers and customers’ email
journeys. This way, you’re not thinking about which email to send based on when an email was last
opened. You’re thinking about which email to send based on where they are in their customer orsubscriber journey.”

Samar Owais

Email Conversion Strategist
Follow Samar on Twitter“Building email programs through automation not only saves time for the email
marketer but also creates opportunities for more conversions when we’re not actively
sending single-email broadcasts. For example, you can set up an automation campaignthat offers personalized coupons to those who abandoned their shopping cart, or
create an automated email that instantly goes to their Inbox when they request specificinformation from your website. All of this data can then be collected and automated to help you
create unique customer profiles.
My bonus tip? Create personalization from the very beginning through an automated welcome series.
Ask new subscribers what categories or topics they’d like to learn about. Create a personalized
preference center for subscribers to choose which emails they’d like to receive. This not only helps
your campaigns stand out in their Inbox but also helps reduce unsubscribes.”

Ali Fuller, CPACC

Marketing Automation Manager, Fiveable
Follow Ali on Twitter and LinkedIn

2021 State of Email

20 / 43

AI is important—but slower on adoption
When it comes to machine learning and AI, adoption is much lower. 33% of marketers use AI in marketing in
general, and 39% plan to in the future.10 However, our research shows only 14% using it specifically in email
marketing today—and they mostly use it for send time optimization.

How machine learning and AI are used in email marketing

70%

55%

47%

32%

Send time
optimization/
personalization

Segmentationand subscriber
targeting

Individualized productrecommendations,content suggestions,etc.

Writing or suggesting
personalized subject
lines, calls-to-action, orother copy

The state of AI in marketing still has a way to go with great potential to dramatically elevate your marketing
program and help you:

• Identify potential customers more quickly and accurately.
• Deliver personalized content and product recommendations.
• Drive higher engagement with your brand through relevant moments that matter.
10 eConsultancy: Experience Index: 2020 Digital Trends

2021 State of Email21 / 43

“As a marketing leader in an email martech company, I’m constantly thinking about new ways tocreate relevant moments of engagement with our prospects, customers, and partners. I’m not alone.
Marketers listed automation, personalization, and customer profile data enrichment as their top threeemail marketing priorities in 2022.
What’s interesting to me is that to deliver true, personalized, one-to-one engagements withcustomers, marketers must effectively address all three of these areas in an accurate, systematic,
and scalable way. To deliver on this, in 2022, I expect to see more marketing organizations using AI
and machine learning (ML) to quickly and easily analyze large amounts of disparate information to
generate millions of personalized communications and offers—one for each customer.”

Melissa SargeantChief Marketing Officer, Litmus
Follow Melissa on LinkedIn

While the science behind AI is complicated, getting started doesn’t have to be.
Roll out AI selectively by addressing tightly-defined and measurable use cases. Focus on enhancing existing
programs where engagements are well understood, processes are defined, and outcomes benchmarked to
fully monitor how the AI is working and driving value over traditional approaches. Programs such as dynamic
email content and email subject-line optimization are great places to start your initiative.

2021 State of Email

22 / 43SHIFT 3#

Privacy measures are forcing marketers
to rethink current strategies
While personalization drives results, and customers want it, we need their data to make it happen.
That being said, privacy has been a hot topic recently with the impending loss of third-party cookies
and now Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection (MPP), which prevents marketers from seeing accurate dataaround email opens, devices, and geolocation from their Apple Mail audience.
In fact, marketers are more worried about MPP than losing third-party cookies.

Which do you think will affect your email
program more?
Loss of third-party cookies

37%

Apple’s

63%

Privacy Protection

204 votes
Source: Litmus poll on LinkedIn

2021 State of Email23 / 43

“The tailwinds are behind email as we look toward 2022. Yes, we’re losing open
tracking on nearly half of email users from Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection. And
I do have concerns on what that will do to list hygiene practices and eventually
deliverability, but this isn’t totally tragic.
We will innovate and overcome the challenges that will inevitably come as a resultof the loss of opens. I’m optimistic that we’ll see more brands embracing privacy as a branddifferentiator and putting privacy policies and data collection points in plain or even conversational
language. I’m looking forward to seeing the creativity that is sure to come from brands that will
explicitly ask their customers what they want from them.
Lastly, the advertising or acquisition end of the ecosystem is dealing with much bigger blows to theirdata with IDFA and third-party cookies going away. As a result, we’ll likely see retention programs,
largely driven by email, get their proper resourcing and budgets. It’ll be much harder to acquire newaudiences, so once a customer has been acquired, they’ll be treated as the precious asset that emailpros have always known them to be. Let’s get the investment our channel deserves to truly drive
lifetime value!”

April Mullen

Director of Brand and Content Marketing, SparkPost
Co-Founder and Board Member, Women of EmailFollow April on LinkedIn and Twitter

The effects of Mail Privacy Protection
So what are marketers doing to address the changes brought by MPP? Tabish offers a perspective from his
agency work:“At first, we were concerned that the KPIs that we used to benchmark our performance will no longer
be accurate. Our concern was really demonstrating ROI to clients. We’re going back to the basics
with MPP and recommitting to focusing our sending strategy on more than just opens. We won’t get
this right immediately, but we’ve been around the block with this one and know that ultimately, thebusiness’ KPIs and email KPIs need to align for any program to be successful. You have to honestly
take a look at your email program and see if it’s benefiting the business, not just saying, ‘Open andclick rates look good, so we’re doing our job.’”

Tabish Bhimani

Founder and Principal Strategist, Mastrat Digital
Follow Tabish on LinkedIn

2021 State of Email24 / 43

And he’s not alone. About 43% of marketers are changing how they measure email performance—by far themost popular tactic for navigating the changes brought about from MPP.

43% of marketers are changing how they measure email performance
because of Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection.
Tweet thisHow Mail Privacy Protection affects email marketing programs
Change how emails are measured

43%
83%

Not making any changes

24%

Run more A/B testing

19%
40%

Change automation flows

16%
38%

Message audiences about MPP or privacy in general

10%

35%

Change data and privacy practices

9%

34%

Change email acquisition practices
Other

68%

6%
4%

28%
23%

Not sure 10%26%“As the privacy landscape continues to change, brands must also change. It’s time to look beyond
staple email metrics like open rates and adapt other powerful KPIs to understand your customer
behavior. Consider how you can maximize your email strategy to identify and connect with your best
customers, using a foundation of actionable insights to see your customers’ engagement acrosschannels to activate behavior-driven personalization.”

Kara Trivunovic

Managing Director, Messaging, Epsilon
Follow Kara on LinkedIn

2021 State of Email25 / 43

“The email open rate has always been a ‘noisy’ metric, so it’s great to see that brands are adjusting
the way in which they measure success for an email campaign. This will mean more emphasison collecting zero-party data and using first-party cookies to understand user intent and makecommunications more relevant.”

Gavin Laugenie

Global Head of Content, dotdigital
Follow Gavin on LinkedIn

Unfortunately, the second most popular response to MPP is making no changes at all (24% of respondents). At
least in the short term.

“The good news is that most email service providers will make platform changes thatwill minimize the impact of some aspects of Mail Privacy Protection, most notably byfiltering out fake opens from Apple and adjusting send time optimization algorithms.
However, the majority of marketers will need to make changes on their end, such as
adjusting their re-engagement strategies and progressive profiling strategies. Many brands will beplaying catchup on implementing these changes in the first quarter of 2022 after the holidays.”

Chad S. White

Head of Research, Oracle Marketing Consulting
Author of Email Marketing Rules

Get your step-by-step action plan
Want more details on MPP and how to thrive without opens? It’s not too late to take action.
Check out The Mail Privacy Protection Survival Guide for Marketers to learn what MPP is, its
impact on email marketing, and steps you need to take to flourish.

Grab the guide2021 State of Email26 / 43

Email metrics aren’t the only thing that’s pivoting. A small but mighty few are doing everything they can totransform their email marketing program now and essentially “privacy proof” it. This way, they won’t have toworry when other email clients or inbox providers follow Apple’s lead.

“The thing with privacy is consent—something which has been traditionally missing in email,unfortunately. The 6% of brands that’ll be focusing on changing email acquisition practices have
got it right. Focus on getting your subscriber to voluntarily give their information to you. That could
be done through quizzes or multi-step opt-in forms. Tools like Octane take away the creep factor ofasking intrusive questions and make info-giving fun for the subscriber.”Samar Owais

Email Conversion Strategist
Follow Samar on Twitter

Even if you move away from open rates, open data is involved in many aspects of email marketing programs,
such as monitoring email deliverability and disengagement. But it’s encouraging to see a greater focus on
subscriber re-engagement campaigns and retention in general, fueled by both MPP and rising acquisition
costs due to the impending loss of third-party cookies. Although 41% currently send re-engagement emails,
25% don’t—but plan to. It’s the second most popular choice for future email plans, just barely behind milestoneemails (another great retention tactic).
And the ongoing dance between gathering the data we need to personalize messages and making sure ouraudience wants us to have that data continues.

“Customer data is an asset. Marketers must manage it accordingly. No longer is it
appropriate or acceptable to guess what information or offers the customer wants. In
fact, it is destructive to the customer relationship. Consumers expect to be served, notsold. When companies make the commitment to understanding individual customer
needs and interests, and using that insight to deliver content that is timely, relevant anduseful, they not only sell more, they create a community of brand advocates who become some of
the company’s most effective marketers.”

Guilda Hilaire

Director, Product Marketing, Salesforce
Follow Guilda on LinkedIn and Twitter

2021 State of Email27 / 43

Defining the four types of data
With all this talk about data and privacy, let’s quickly go over the different types of data.

Definition

ExamplesZero-party data

Individual-level data explicitly given
to you directly from your audience• Email preferences• Topic or product interests• Account preferences

First-party data

Individual-level data collected fromyour audience on your own channels• Email engagement• Website activity• Purchase history

Second-party data

Individual-level data acquired from atrusted partner aka someone else’s
first-party data

• Co-marketing efforts• Customer reviews• Loyalty programs

Third-party data

Aggregate data collected from one ormore sources• Browsing activity (via cookies)• Demographics• Survey responses

The lower the data type, the closer you are to your audience but the narrower your reach. So, zero-party data
is like talking directly with your customers. On the other hand, third-party data is like shouting into a stadium fullof people. Your reach is greater, but you don’t know exactly who you’re talking to (and it can come off creepy
since consent is not explicit).
Because of growing privacy concerns, you’ll want to lean more heavily into your zero-party and first-party data.

“Improving your use of first-party data is a great way to adapt your strategies to these new privacy
measures. First-party data can be used to find valuable patterns in your subscribers’ actions andimprove your program’s performance.”

Dr. Ada Y. BarlattFounder and Data Scientist, OperationsAlly
Follow Ada on LinkedIn

An easy way to get started with zero-party data is to create a preference center—or optimize your existing one
to make sure you’re capturing the information you need to deliver an excellent subscriber experience.

2021 State of Email28 / 43

When it comes to first-party data? There’s a lot to consider beyond email opens to inform your email strategy
and tactics, so be sure you’re looking at holistic email metrics to see the whole picture. Not doing so can haveyou incorrectly analyzing emails—and send you down the wrong path.

Holistic email metrics matrix
Long term

Subscriber
relationships

Direct business
impactShort term

Email list
healthEmail channel
success

Subsciber
reactionEmailcampaign’s
success

Emailengagement

Emailcampaign’s
omnichannel
influence

Deliverability

Email program’s
omnichannel
influence

Inbox provider
relationships

Indirect business
impactEstablish trust with email authentication
Another way to gain your audience’s trust is through email authentication. Basically, ways to prove you are
who you say you are to help people and inbox providers recognize you and prevent email fraud and spoofing.
About half of marketers use some form of email authentication today.
The newest kid on the authentication block is BIMI (Brand Indicators for Message Identification), which verifies
brands by showing their logo next to their sender name in the inbox. BIMI has been shown to increase open
rates by 21%, increase average purchase likelihood by 34%, increase brand recall by 18%, and increase
confidence in email by 90%.11
11 Red Sift and Entrust: Consumer Interaction with Visual Brands in Email2021 State of Email29 / 43

Only 15% have implemented BIMI so far, but 21% plan to. And with the recent Gmail + BIMI announcement, we
expect these numbers to go up drastically into the next year or two.

Email authentication
Plan to use

SPF

Sender Policy
Framework

Currently use

60
50
40
30
20
10

BIMI

DKIM

Brand Indicators for
Message Identification

DomainKeys
Identified Mail

DMARC

Domain-based Message Authentication,
Reporting & Conformance“We’ve implemented BIMI for our clients even before BIMI was trending. We always
knew a Verified Mark Certificate would eventually be required, but we set up BIMI
because it helps with deliverability. As an aside, our email marketing agency first sets
up the sending infrastructure before sending any emails. This is a best-in-class practice
we’ve implemented that has helped us grow smaller and medium sized accounts
properly because they haven’t always followed best sending practices.”

Tabish Bhimani

Founder and Principal Strategist, Mastrat Digital
Follow Tabish on LinkedIn

Want to set up BIMI for your company’s emails?
Check out our blog post: How to Set Up BIMI for Brand Recognition in the Inbox

2021 State of Email30 / 43SHIFT 4#

Brands are looking to agile marketing tomeet their growing email demandIt’s been over a year since the COVID-19 pandemic began. How have brands had to pivot since then?
84% have had to change their email marketing strategy at least a little bit—whether for better orworse. 11% have so far made it through unchanged.

How COVID-19 impacted email strategy

62%

11%

22%

Changedsignificantly

2021 State of EmailChanged alittle bit

Did notchange at all

5%
Not sure

31 / 43

Email workload is going way up
Diving deeper into comparing before the pandemic to now, email teams and budgets have mostly stayed thesame while the workload has increased.

Top 5 of what has increased, decreased, or
remained the same since the pandemic

Increased

Working remotely: 82%
Email workload: 70%
Email volume: 61%
Last-minute email changes: 45%

Remained the same

Educational email content: 43%

Personalization: 57%
Full-time email team size: 56%
Email marketing budget: 54%
Leadership involvement with email marketing: 49%
Newsletters: 47%

Decreased

Marketing budget overall: 20%
Full-time email team size: 14%
Promotional email content: 12%
Email marketing budget: 10%
Email engagement: 9%

Before the pandemic vs. now: 70% of brands have increased email
marketing workload but budgets haven’t changed (yet).
Tweet this2021 State of Email32 / 43

That may feel glum, but it’s a hot market for email marketing right now—a sign that brands recognize the valueof the email channel and want to invest in it to keep up with their growing needs (as evidenced in Shift #1).

“Ouch. Email talent was already stretched thin before, and email pros showed themselves to bereal team players during the unforeseen events of 2020. But if brands want to continue the trend of
leaning heavily into the email channel, resource allocation needs to follow suit. The demand for email
expertise (as well as competitive compensation) is at an all-time high, and pros who are frustrated byincreased demands without adequate support will be tempted to go elsewhere.”

Jen Capstraw

President & Co-Founder, Women of EmailFollow Jen on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram

Solving for longer lead times
Unfortunately, production cycles or turnaround time is getting longer while volume is increasing. The number ofmarketers spending 2 weeks or more on a single email has gone up by more than 28% since 2017.

Marketers with 2+ weeks email production cycles
58%
53%
49%
45%

45%

2017

2018

2019

2020

2021

So while companies are hiring more, they’re also looking for more agile ways to work.

2021 State of Email33 / 43

“With email production cycles getting longer and so many emails in flight on any given day, marketersmust be agile in how they work. Think about collaboration, goal alignment, and change managementwith the cross-functional teams they work with.”

Bruce Swann

Principal Product Marketing Manager, Customer Journey Management, Adobe
Follow Bruce on LinkedIn

Email workflows are being streamlined through the use of modular design systems and reusable components
such as snippets and partials. Email snippets and partials give brands the most flexibility and creativity when it
comes to building emails while still maintaining brand integrity. 43% use them today but another 12% plan to,
and we expect adoption to continue to go up.

Email development methods

76%

Currently use

58%

Plan to use

43%

13%

12%

16%
8%

5%
HTML email
framework or
templates

2021 State of EmailEmailguidelines ordesign system

Snippets

Partials

34 / 43

Let’s get modular
Speed up and add flexibility to your workflow with modular emails.
Whip your emails into tip-top shape—with these helpful resources:☐ 10-minute Emails: How I Save Time On Development☐ 6 Steps to a Powerful Email Design System Your Team Will Love
☐ Email Modules: How to Actually Scale Unique Emails with Confidence☐ Ultimate Guide to Email Templates☐ The Ultimate Guide to Using Snippets in Email Design☐ Create and Manage Dynamic Code Blocks Easily with Email Partials☐ Examples of Partials and Snippets to Steal“Many of our clients have turned to modular email architecture to reduce their email production times.
On average, our clients have been able to reduce email production times by 25% to 40% by switching
to a modular build system from a traditional template-based system.
In the current environment—where business disruptions seem routine, consumer attitudes are
evolving quickly, and marketing teams are lean—this extra nimbleness is an incredibly valuable asset.”

Chad S. White

Head of Research, Oracle Marketing Consulting
Author of Email Marketing Rules

But no matter how fast an email is built, the feedback process is overburdened and slowing things down. As
cumbersome as email threads can be, it’s still the most popular with 62% of marketers going that route forreviewing and approving emails. Fortunately, that’s 10% less than last year. Perhaps we can attribute that to therise of remote work and asynchronous communication—and the tools that support them.

Most popular email proofing methods

62%

48%

38%

Email thread or comments,
especially in reply to a test send

Messaging apps like
Slack or Teams

Live in person or overvideo calls

2021 State of Email35 / 43

“We always talk about eliminating silos, whether it be data silos, technical silos, or team silos. But
instead of focusing on removing silos, email marketers should focus on eliminating the problems theycause, like bottlenecks associated with stalled approval processes, inefficient production cycles, andmisalignment on objectives.”

Bruce Swann

Principal Product Marketing Manager, Customer Journey Management, Adobe
Follow Bruce on LinkedIn“Increased demands on email marketing combined with flat budgets and email teamresources opens the door for agile marketing to help organizations adapt to changing
priorities, improve productivity, and accelerate delivery of campaigns and programs.
Optimizing campaign delivery is critical for every modern marketing organization,
especially in bringing email campaigns to life.
In fact, the majority of marketers shared this sentiment with us in our annual State of Email survey.
76% are using frameworks or templates and 58% are using email guidelines or design systems to findmore agile ways to work. While design systems, snippets, and partials accelerate email production,
the feedback and proofing process continues to hamstring the workflow, potentially nullifying thegains achieved in email design and development.
That’s why the time is right for the industry to transform and make agile marketing practices the newnormal in email marketing.”

Melissa SargeantChief Marketing Officer, Litmus
Follow Melissa on LinkedIn

Easily achieve agile email marketing
Speed up your email workflow—without sacrificing quality. Learn how with agile email
marketing. Discover the micro-efficiencies so easy to adopt, even your most stubborn
stakeholders can’t resist.

Go agile2021 State of Email36 / 43SHIFT 5#

Marketing must embrace the state of theworld—brand purpose matters
On top of the pandemic, we’ve also experienced social and economic strife, bringing the topic ofdiversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I) to the forefront. In a world that is deeply suffering, empathy ismore important than ever.

“Consumers expect brands to take a stance on issues affecting society. Anyone in youremail database has given you their valuable data. A value exchange of trust has takenplace. As a result, these consumers expect transparency on the stance of brands they’reclosest to. It’s no longer acceptable to stay quiet and neutral. This means email teams
are going to be tasked with leaning into the hard conversations inside their companies toconvey the right message externally.”

April Mullen

Director of Brand and Content Marketing, SparkPost
Co-Founder and Board Member, Women of EmailFollow April on LinkedIn and Twitter

62% of marketers at least sometimes change the tone of an email in reaction to what’s happeningaround the world.

2021 State of Email37 / 43

“Understanding the needs of our audience is paramount. It’s no longer viable to just sell toindividuals. Brands need to consider their feelings and stance on worldly matters. Building trust
through displaying your brand’s position on environmental and ethical affairs and being a more
responsible marketer is how you differentiate yourself from the competition and gain a competitive
advantage.
But a word of warning, your customers can see through a veil of lies, so it’s important not just to
appear more responsible, but to walk the walk, too.”

Gavin Laugenie

Global Head of Content, dotdigital
Follow Gavin on LinkedIn

How often world events
impact empathy and tonein emails

31%
24%

20%
11%

8%

6%
Always

Often

Sometimes

RarelyNever

Not sure

Marketers are cautious of DE&I messaging
But when it comes to addressing DE&I head on, 42% haven’t sent an email about their company’s stance on
DE&I—nor do they plan to. That’s more than the marketers who already have or will (34%). And it’s a sensitive
issue that many can and have gotten wrong, which explains why 24% just aren’t sure.

2021 State of Email38 / 43

27%

24%

Yes

Not sure

Have you sent any
emails to address
your company’s
stance on DE&I?

42%

7%

No, and no plans toNo, but planning to

42% haven’t sent an email about their company’s
stance on DE&I—nor do they plan to.
Tweet this“Bo Burnham poked fun at woke marketing on his Netflix special, ‘Inside,’ earlier thisyear. But the objective behind today’s DEI-centric messaging is actually nothing new:
It aims to build a sense of solidarity with audiences and elicit an emotional connection.
That’s a strategy marketers have been harnessing for decades, most notably, theiconic Coca-Cola Company’s ‘Buy the World a Coke’ campaign in 1971, which offered amessage of tolerance and hope during a conflict-plagued moment in time.
History is simply repeating itself.
Many brands consider DEI messaging risky. And it is! Right or wrong, some audiences find it offensive
or inappropriate. Even champions of DEI may accuse a brand of virtue signaling when they join thistrend. It’s easy to get wrong. But intentionally skirting the topic could have repercussions as well inthis moment of hyper-awareness.”

Jen Capstraw

President & Co-Founder, Women of EmailFollow Jen on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram

2021 State of Email39 / 43

Address DE&I with great care
Both the risk and reward of DE&I messaging are great. So what should you do? Experts weigh in.

“Brands that don’t enter the conversations their customers are having or aren’t empathetic about
the issues their customers are facing lose more than just an opportunity to build brand loyalty.
Consumers are smart. They can smell lip service from an email’s subject line.
So before hitting send on a DE&I email, brands need to come up with a company-wide policy on how
to handle the issues affecting their customers. If you don’t have a plan, strategy, or process, they’ll
end up sending an ‘In these unprecedented times’ email—and we all know how those are perceived.”

Samar Owais

Email Conversion Strategist
Follow Samar on Twitter“Ecommerce businesses that have virtually started and grown into large organizations
overnight have never thought about DE&I simply because they haven’t had to, or
weren’t expecting to. They’ve never had to contend with finding their voice in theconversation.
Some also are scared of alienating their subscriber base by openly expressing support
for specific movements such as Black Lives Matter or International Women’s Day. They ultimately
support both these movements—and more—but don’t know how to tread through this.
If I lean on my public relations training, I can say that it is up to email marketers to do their part ongetting buy-in from the C-suite to:• Focus some time thinking about company values.
• Articulate them internally.
• Then share them with customers.
Ultimately, when making decisions, values are really all we have to fall back on. Even if that’s fallingback on the bottom line as the key decision driver, that itself falls back on fundamental values.”

Tabish Bhimani

Founder and Principal Strategist, Mastrat Digital
Follow Tabish on LinkedIn

2021 State of Email40 / 43

Even if brands choose to explicitly say nothing about DE&I, many are at least making more conscious efforts tomake their emails more diverse and inclusive through imagery, language, and content. Seeing as this requiresa more ongoing effort, it could be seen as more genuine (walking the talk), and that might be enough to appeal
to and attract some subscribers.

64%

Conscious
DE&I efforts
made in email

61%

38%
19%
Demographics
represented inimagery

Inclusive
language in
copy

Celebrating
diverseholidays

Not sure“The latest US Census data confirmed what we already knew—that we live in a country
that’s increasingly diverse and less monolithic. Young people are at the forefront ofdriving these changes, rejecting brands that don’t accurately portray the diversity of theirworld and don’t support the social values that are important to them.
In response, many brands are leaning into using less gendered language, being more
inclusive with their photography choices, and participating in cultural conversations.”

Chad S. White

Head of Research, Oracle Marketing Consulting
Author of Email Marketing Rules

83% of millennials say it’s important that companies they buy from also align with their values, and 73% of 35-54
year olds and 60% of 55+ year olds agree.12 It’s becoming more and more clear that brands have to recognize
the world we’re living in and be a constant ally, not a performative one.
12 5W Public Relations: 2020 Consumer Culture Report

2021 State of Email41 / 43

Emails for everyone
Create emails with diversity, inclusion, equity, and empathy in mind. Learn how—with
these helpful resources:☐ Why Empathy Wins in Email Marketing☐ 5 Examples of Great Email Communication During COVID-19☐ The Importance of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Marketing☐ Delivering Episode 29: Kevin Tyler on Inclusion in Marketing☐ What it Takes to Create More Inclusive Email Marketing Experiences☐ Trending in Email Design: Representation☐ The Dos and Don’ts of Season’s Greetings Emails (+ 17 Examples)☐ The Ultimate Guide to Email Accessibility

Now what?
With the wild years we’ve experienced and the growing uncertainty of the future, it’s no surprise that:• Email marketing has become essential to business.
• Personalization and automation are must-haves to thrive.
• Privacy measures are shaking things up—in a good way.
• Brands are going agile to meet increased email demand.
• Marketing must embrace the state of the world.

“COVID-19 made the inbox an even more competitive space, and companies that aren’t
using email to create great experiences will lose out. Segmentation and personalizationmust become the standard in your email marketing. Privacy controls will forcechanges, but marketers will adjust. It’s a great time to work in email marketing.”

Hillel Berg

CEO, Hillel Berg Email Marketing
Follow Hillel on LinkedIn

2021 State of Email42 / 43

To keep your email marketing program sharp, let’s recap
the top takeaways for moving forward:• Increase your email marketing investment to prevent burnout and drive more powerful results
alongside other marketing channels.

• Make a great first impression by optimizing your newsletters, welcome series, and onboarding flows.
• Create an accurate ROI calculation using accurate email marketing costs. Tie those to conversion
tracking using sales and revenue driven by email.

• Pursue more zero-party and first-party data such as email preferences and behavioral activity to
aid in personalizing emails beyond first name and measuring email performance—even as privacy
measures continue to gain ground.

• Don’t be afraid to A/B test big changes like images vs. no images. You’re likely to see more impactful
results than minor differences like a single word change.

• Scale your email efforts with automation, AI, and agile marketing to get more done, faster. For
example, switch to modular email design to quickly produce flexible, on-brand, and error-free emails.

• Humanize your brand by empathizing with your audience and what’s affecting their lives, aligning
your company values with theirs, and creating more inclusive experiences.
Keep the trends revealed in this report in mind as you develop your email marketing strategy for the rest of
this year and beyond. Check out Litmus for quick and painless email building, pre-send email testing, andpost-send email analytics to ensure your emails perform.

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2021 State of Email43 / 43