College Students Cool to E-mail Marketing: eROI
Students dislike marketing e-mail.
That’s among the findings of a new survey by eROI.
Of the 233 high school and college kids polled, 61% “rarely to never” check marketing e-mails. Only 16% regularly read them. And 66% never take action on marketing messages.
Why this disdain? “Most college students do not feel that companies are effectively speaking to them personally,” according to eROI.
Of those who do respond, 60% do so because of interest in the product. Another 47% are drawn by special offers, and only 11% by e-mail design. Only one fourth got an e-mail address to buy online.
Here’s more bad news for e-mail marketers. Of the college students polled, 37% cited texting as their preferred means of communciation, compared with 26% for e-mail. Social networking IM was next at 15%, instant messaging at 11% and social networking e-mail at 11%.
Only 36% use e-mail alerts to keep up with their social networks.
Two thirds check their e-mail at least once per day, and over half three times a day. College students have a median of 2.4 e-mail addresses, and most have had e-mail accounts for eight years, with the average one getting their first at age 13.
Why do they bother with e-mail at all? The vast majority—81%—get an e-mail address to communicate with family.
Gmail is the top service with college students—32% use it as their primary address. The distant runners-up include Yahoo (19%), MSN (18%), school addresses (17%) and other (14%).
As for the social networks used, 83% belong to Facebook, 65% to MySpace and 21% to LinkedIn.
