E-mail churn has remained constant for the last two years despite an increase in the number of e-mail addresses.
In 2002 the annual churn rate was 31% compared to 32% in 2000, according to a survey of by Return Path and NFO WorldGroup, which is to be released at the 85th Annual Direct Marketing Association conference next week in San Francisco.
Consumers on average now own 3.1 e-mail addresses, which is up from 2.6 in the 2000 study.
Overall, 49% of the survey respondents said they had changed an e-mail address–either work or personal—at some point in the past.
Why do people change? Of the 43% who had changed their personal e-mail address, over half said the reason was because they switched Internet service providers. Some 16% found a new e-mail address to avoid spam; 12% because they moved their residence; and 8% switched to a more attractive e-mail address.
More than 50% of participants said they had lost touch with personal contacts and Web sites as a result of the e-mail change. Young adults (53%) are significantly more likely to lose these contacts than older individuals (42%).
The results of the study are based on responses from 1,015 consumers from NFO WorldGroup’s online panel of U.S. Internet users over the age of 18. The panel is representative of U.S. households, according to Return Path.
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