Email continues to be valuable and preferred marketing channel

Despite the rise in popularity of mobile and social channels, email continues to be most popular. Nearly all (97%) of respondents cited email as the top marketing channel followed by social with 70%.

Released during Message Systems' second user conference in San Diego earlier this week, the "Marketing Channel and Engagement Benchmark Survey" compiled data from more than 100 marketing and email industry professionals from around the world.

Almost two-thirds (63%) of respondents also reported that email provides the best ROI, trouncing the number that cited social. Furthermore, benefits of email include the ability to provide a more engaging and detailed message than via SMS or social and its low cost.

"Despite recent reports that the return on investment with email marketing has been declining over the past few years, our survey found that email is thriving, and driving more revenue and conversions than any other channel," said George Schlossnagle, CEO of Message Systems.

Other findings from the survey include:

- Marketers are increasingly using social media to engage and interact with customers. 64% of respondents had added social media in the past 12 months to enhance engagement.

- SMS is becoming more popular in customer engagement strategies. While 44% plan to invest in social media and 40% in email, a healthy 22% plan to use SMS in the future.

Tags: customer engagement, email marketing, marketing campaign, SMS, social media