Spending on e-mail marketing will hit $13.4 billion this year, according to Veronis Suhler Stevenson’s latest Communications Industry Forecast. That constitutes a 12.7% growth rate over 2008’s $11.9 billion level and runs strongly counter to the trend of other channels in the direct-marketing category, most of which (direct mail, telemarketing, catalog) are expected to post single-digit declines. The lone other exception: direct-response TV, which will show a 1.2% increase this year.

In terms of audiences targeted, VSS projects that e-mail spending will be about evenly divided this year between consumer messaging ($6.9 billion, up 12% from last year) and business-to-business communications ($7.6 billion, up 13.2% from 2008.) Those figures include spending with third-party vendors for company-sponsored e-mail, e-mail campaigns, Web site marketing and spending on display ads embedded in third-party e-mail.

Why does e-mail remain so robust, for all the predictions that it will be superseded by other marketing media? In short, reach, targetability and low costs. “US E-mail Marketing Forecast, 2009 to 2014,” a June report by Forrester Research, predicts that the number of U.S. active e-mail users — defined as those who log into one or more e-mail accounts at least monthly — will grow from 145 million this year to 153 million by 2014. The growth of social media will help fuel this increase as more users open “social inbox” accounts within their online social networks.

The Forrester report, by analyst David Daniels, also predicts that retention messages will account for three-quarters of all spending on permission-based e-mail by 2014. Within the channel, Forrester expects the biggest spending growth over the next five years to be in promotional messages inserted into transactional e-mail.

“Fourteen percent of e-mail marketing executives that we surveyed told us that they plan to begin placing offers in their transactional messages,” the report said. “Additionally, the rise of consumers using the social inbox will drive e-mail alert messages that inform subscribers of ‘pokes,’ wall posts and status updates — contributing to an increase in service-oriented transactional messages.”

E-mail Snapshot:

• 2010 Spending $13.4 billion
• 17% growth over 2008
• Spending on consumer messaging $6.9 billion (in 2009)
• Up 12%
• Spending on b-to-b communications $7.6 billion (in 2009)
• Up 13.2%
• U.S. active e-mail users grows to 153 million by 2014

I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed reading Betsy Spethmann’s column a few moments ago (“Off Target,” June promo). It’s about time another sane human showed up in my life. Maybe, if the Justice Department can tell Microsoft to behave in specific, non-monopolistic ways, someone should be able to tell DMMs to vary assortment, design, marketing schemes, etc. locally and regionally so as not to monopolize sameness and boredom.

Peter Dugan

Vice Chairman DVC, Inc. Morristown, NJ