By Kristy Hesom

What happened?

Several notable changes in the industry emerged in 2015, including increased mobile usage, improved strategy and a decrease in the spamming of audiences. 

Increased mobile use was both a trend and a challenge this year. Matthew Arnold, head of media at NATIVE VML, believes the dramatic increase in the presence of mobile devices in South Africa has benefited email marketing. Mobile has meant an increase in open rates and engagement. On the other hand, Mark Pape, digital strategist and business founder at Deep Current, feels that the lack of a mobile responsive design for email marketing was one of the challenges marketers saw this year.  

Vera Romano, marketing manager at Everletic, says that 2015 has seen a “more strategic approach [being] taken towards including email marketing within the overall marketing communications mix".

Pape says blacklisting management was also a challenge in 2015 while Romano says that people involved in email marketing are “taking a more serious stance on reducing spam".

What changed?

With companies pushing harder for return on investment (ROI), Arnold believes that this shift in media thinking is the reason “channels like Google Search and Email have seen [a] rise in popularity due to the cost efficiency and ability to generate leads/sales”.

Romano says that one of the most significant changes this year has been marketers making use of much more personalised ways of talking to consumers. This benefits both marketers and consumers, she explains. She also says that marketers are sending out more relevant, good quality content as they are “becoming very strict on maintaining high standards of hygiene with their databases.”

Pape says that a positive change that he’s seen this year is how email marketing has now become a part of the user experience. 

“Email is becoming a significant player in handling the full user experience across multiple digital platforms,” says Pape. "By applying the correct strategy, Email can ensure that your customer is always connected and informed throughout their ‘experience’ with your brand or business, this improves ROI, and, in turn, is good for marketing.”

What can we expect in 2016?

While Romano says that there was a movement towards more personalised email content in 2015, she believes 2016 will see a continuation of this trend. When brands have “had a taste of what a relevant email can do for brand awareness, it will inspire marketers to start rolling this out on a much larger scale", she says.

Romano also says it’s imperative that email marketers think mobile first. Jason Hawkings, writing for Search Engine Journal, agrees: “Mobile is an obvious trend [for 2016] in the digital marketing world, but, even more important to the email channel." Hawkings points out that marketers can see what devices their users are making use of (with an analytics program) and use this information to “inform your email designs, including responsiveness, font size and the location of your CTAs”. 

Arnold believes that 2016 will see email marketing and social media merging through “more sophisticated CRM programs” that will, in turn, “provide a seamless customer experience”.  The merging of social media and email marketing could also see an increase of hashtags being used in email subject lines.

In an article written for Code Fear, Ravi Ahuju, says, "The use of hashtags in the subject line can be beneficial as it can contribute to the open rates." In fact, hashtag mailing has shown a slight increase (4.8%) in open rates. 

What are your thoughts? Have you noticed any other big changes or trends in email marketing over the past year? Tell us below.