Experian Marketing Services, has just presented the results of the first international study on effects of campaigns sending emails during the holiday season. This study includes the analysis of more than 100,000 e-mail campaigns by more than 1,000 brands in 10 markets including Australia, China, France, Hong Kong, India, New Zealand, Singapore, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States. October and the end of December 2012.

The goal is to better understand how potential customers respond to commercial messages sent over the Internet and the similarities and differences of Internet users in different regions of the world.

For many economic activities, the holiday season is the highest percentage of income. This study brings to international brands knowledge and information that can help your marketing teams increase and optimize their communication plans for the next holiday season depending on the country or region they are targeting.

Miguel Poyatos, Director of Customer Management for Experian Marketing Services, says about the results: “The holiday season is very important and significant for brands, since it depends on success or failure of revenue targets for everything The international study of emails during the holiday period, demonstrates the differences and similarities that exist in the behaviors and responses of clients in the different regions, and this knowledge gives us data and ideas to offer more effective strategies to our clients.

Key findings :

Globally, most successful communications sent brands during the holiday season are the coupons discount either a percentage discount on the product or a fixed amount, although the response varies considerably depending on the country.

• In Spain, the free shipping offer is not widely not even during the holiday season. The maturity of this market, especially for e-commerce as well as consumer applications are growing simultaneously. Using these types of offers can be the key element of a campaign’s success
• In China they are widely used campaigns that offer a percentage discount, while it is true that these campaigns had a higher rate of opening messages that standard shipping, but with a lower clickthrough redirecting supply.
• In New Zealand and France they are mostly used discount promotions for fixed amounts of money. However, even though the vast majority of campaigns offered the cash discount on the subject line, these messages had a lower opening and click rate than standard campaigns.

The best day to send emails (weekend versus weekly) depends on the market.

• Consumers in the UK respond weekends more often. Expectations that e – commerce can offer them the best deals and the boom of smartphones  and mobile devices may be contributing to this increased response rate on the weekends, as smartphones allow multitasking and compare prices Online, something they can not do in the physical store.
• During the holiday season in India and France index he experienced openings and clicks lower on weekends than on weekdays. However, in the United States it occurred just the opposite, since participation was higher in weekends.
• Australia, Singapore and New Zealand also show a greater response during weekends than on weekdays. However, in the Asia-Pacific markets, such as Singapore, Hong Kong and China it is not sending a lot of emails on weekends. This could be a great opportunity for companies that send their emails to Asia-Pacific countries, as would achieve high rates of openings and clicks  for your campaigns currently being carried out during the week.

International brands can benefit from a “ first mover advantage ” (the advantage of acting first) in those markets where email marketing is less mature, and innovate in their markets because the same practices and tactics are not performed in all markets .

Campaigns to prevent cart abandonment of the virtual purchase usually produce high response rates, where rates of click during the holiday season were 13.2 percent. However, many retailers do not use this way to recover the customer, but they should consider it, especially during the holiday season.

Birthday emails during the holiday season can also be used to entice buyers with the excuse of delivering a gift. Although this is a proven strategy for e-mail vendors, no Asian brand has been detected using this tactic, so it is a clear opportunity.