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The Association for Intelligent Information Management (AIIM) released its highly anticipated “AIIM 2024 Industry Watch: State of the Intelligent Information Management Practice” report.
This comprehensive study provides valuable insights into the current landscape and future trends of information management, focusing on the human drivers behind industry evolution.
The report highlights three critical areas:
❯ The emergence of the Information Leader - The 2024 report reveals the rise of information leaders as crucial figures in organizations. These professionals possess diverse skill sets and strategic vision, evidenced by their increasing seniority, decision-making authority, and compensation.
❯ Universal prioritization of information management - Effective information management has become essential for businesses of all sizes and industries.
Key motivators include compliance, risk mitigation, digital transformation, and cost and productivity optimization.
❯ The evolving information management technology stack - The report explores the expanding toolkit of information management practitioners, with a focus on AI and automation technologies. Workflow and process automation, generative AI, and machine learning are emerging as top solutions, despite challenges such as poor data quality and lack of system interoperability.
The importance of information management is expected to grow, with 72 percent of respondents agreeing that it will become more critical in the next twelve months.
“Information or unstructured data is vital to the success of the modern enterprise and the fuel for artificial intelligence and process automation,” explained AIIM President & CEO Tori Miller Liu, CIP. “This report shows that skilled information management practitioners
and robust practices are vital to successful unstructured data management and achieving better business outcomes in today’s world.”
The 2024 report was produced in conjunction with DAMA International and supported by RIMPA Global, bringing additional expertise and a global perspective to this year’s research. AIIM extends its gratitude to the report underwriters: Colligo, Microsoft, and OpenText, for their support in making this valuable industry research possible. Founded in 1944, the Association for Intelligent Information Management (AIIM) is a nonprofit organization serving information leaders in over 67 countries worldwide.
AIIM’s vision is to create a world where every organization benefits from intelligent information and data management to achieve better business outcomes.
In the wake of rapid digitalization, advanced technologies like big data and artificial intelligence are transforming the landscape.
Independent websites have gained new relevance in this era. As generative AI reshapes numerous industries, crossborder E-commerce seeks to harness these advancements to boost competitiveness and growth. A stable, efficient, and intelligent independent website platform is now crucial for businesses aiming to expand globally and achieve success.
As a leading enterprise in China’s crossborder E-commerce SaaS sector, Shoplazza continuously innovates its product offerings, providing in-depth solutions that open new growth avenues for merchants. Its zeroprogramming SaaS site construction system and self-developed marketing tools, including videos and 3D models, enable businesses to quickly and easily create independent websites tailored to their needs. With features like one-click synchronization of store products to platforms like Facebook and TikTok, Shoplazza has garnered high praise from users and multiple accolades from CCTV within just a year.
Independent merchants face unprecedented challenges today, standing at a pivotal historical moment. They must adapt to changes and navigate the competitive landscape to thrive in this new era. This marks the beginning of a golden age for independent websites.
Branding: The “Post-Golden Age” of DTC Online Store
What makes independent websites appealing? They offer a completely autonomous space for brands to showcase their identity. Enterprises can vividly narrate their brand stories through unique
packaging and exquisite product pages, establishing a closer emotional connection with consumers. This flexibility and freedom make independent websites increasingly popular for businesses aiming to expand internationally and capture market attention.
The Surge and Challenges of DTC Online Store in
China
This trend is particularly evident in China. According to the “China Cross-Border Export E-Commerce Development Report (2022),” the number of Chinese independent offshore websites has surged in recent years, reaching about 200,000 in 2022 and projected to exceed 500,000 by 2025. This growth reflects the increasing recognition of independent websites’ value by platform sellers and industrytrade integration enterprises, prompting many to transition to this business model.
However, the rise of independent online stores brings its own set of challenges. New merchants, especially those lacking technical expertise, face higher operational hurdles in the AI era compared to the past decade. Enhancing brand awareness and expanding sales in a competitive market are urgent issues for these users.
To address these challenges, businesses must actively seek solutions. Partnering with professional teams or third-party service providers can lower the technical barriers and facilitate the rapid development of tailored independent websites. Additionally, businesses need to innovate their marketing strategies, leveraging social media, search engine optimization (SEO), and other techniques to boost brand exposure and user engagement, thus standing out in the “postgolden age” of independent websites.
Shoplazza offers comprehensive technical solutions for independent website merchants, including a global SaaS platform, high-conversion marketing plugins, and the all-in-one Shoplazza POS solution. These tools help merchants quickly build E-commerce platforms, reduce technical and operational costs, and provide extensive industry experience and professional support. This support enables merchants to quickly establish their business models and marketing strategies, driving rapid growth.
Innovation: The Next Step for DTC Online Stores
Despite the importance of independent online stores for global brand expansion, ease of use and rapid setup are top concerns for new E-commerce users. According to GoodsFox’s research, most independent websites operate for less than three years. While many sites experience positive growth, typically under 20%, about 35% face negative growth challenges.
Addressing these pain points, Shoplazza has launched comprehensive solutions,
including a zero-programming SaaS system that allows merchants to quickly build independent websites without technical expertise. This system reduces the technical barriers and speeds up website construction, enhancing operational efficiency.
Shoplazza also offers a highly customizable code structure, enabling businesses to modify themes and add functions as needed. This flexibility helps merchants better meet customer needs and enhance the user experience.
Furthermore, leveraging generative AI, Shoplazza developed the GenAl marketing material creation platform, which increases material production efficiency by 30% and enables minute-level drawing. The AI website Copilot allows for automatic material generation and intelligent website construction through simple interactions and clicks.
Building a platform is just the first step. Enhancing brand awareness and sales is crucial. Shoplazza offers high-conversion marketing plugins, including promotional tools, membership management systems, and data analysis tools. These plugins help merchants develop precise marketing strategies and engage in real-time customer interactions, boosting loyalty and conversion rates.
The intelligent customer service system, powered by large model technology like ChatGPT, automates human-computer interactions, quickly addresses user inquiries, reduces customer service costs, and improves satisfaction. Advanced model technology also enhances search and recommendation functions, improving accuracy and increasing revenue.
As businesses expand, multi-channel management and order fulfillment become vital. Shoplazza POS solution supports centralized order management, inventory synchronization, and fulfillment optimization, enhancing operational efficiency.
Managing customer lifecycle value is also crucial. Practical after-sales communication tools and services strengthen brand-consumer connections, promoting customer loyalty.
Case Study: ICOICE Cosmetic Contact Lenses
ICOICE, an emerging brand in the Asian cosmetic contact lenses market, faces intense competition. Seeking differentiation, ICOICE turned to the European and American markets. Shoplazza provided a customized independent website solution, including features tailored for cosmetic contact lenses. This solution supports unique purchase functionalities and efficient inventory and order management, enhancing customer experience and operational efficiency.
The dedicated management system for cosmetic contact lenses improves inventory management and reduces development costs. The independent platform allows
ICOICE to engage users throughout the shopping lifecycle, achieving precise marketing and higher conversion rates.
Strategy: Branding, Personalization, and Localization
Successful cross-border E-commerce requires understanding overseas markets and integrating global resources. Branding is key to building consumer trust in independent websites. Personalization and localization are also essential for brand building.
Personalization attracts and retains users. Using big data and AI algorithms, independent websites can analyze user behavior to deliver personalized content and product recommendations, improving user experience and loyalty.
Localization is crucial for market competitiveness. Independent websites must cater to local consumer needs through language translation, currency conversion, and localized payment and logistics solutions. Shoplazza helps businesses adapt to different markets, providing seamless local experiences for international success.
As globalization deepens, independent websites connect brands with global consumers. Shoplazza aims to create a seamless shopping world through technological innovation and global market expansion, collaborating with renowned global enterprises to build an open, win-win E-commerce ecosystem.
Serving merchants across Asia Pacific, Europe, and North America globally, Shoplazza has gained the trust of numerous cross-border E-commerce customers and established solid partnerships with Google, TikTok, Meta, PayPal, and others.
Looking ahead, Shoplazza will continue exploring the E-commerce field with global merchants, optimizing products and services to meet changing market needs. The vision is clear: to transform shopping from a mere transactional activity into an exciting journey of exploration and make retail smarter. Shoplazza aims to create a seamlessly connected shopping world where every purchase is an excellent experience for consumers.
Adthena, a leading provider of search intelligence for enterprise brands, announced a major update to Ask Arlo, a groundbreaking conversational AI tool designed to revolutionize the way marketers interact with and gain insights from their search data.
Version 1.0 was introduced in 2023 to help users navigate Adthena. The 2.0 update leverages real-time GenAI to answer customers’ complex questions about their own search
data and deliver instant, tailored responses and reports directly within the platform.
“Our real-time, conversational chatbot, Ask Arlo, is built using our own in-house technology that harnesses the latest generative AI to help customers see through vast search data trends and identify immediate actions to gain ROI in Google Ads.” says Paul Felby, Chief Technical Officer at Adthena. “This innovative tool represents a huge opportunity to unlock value for our customers at scale, enabling users at all levels to make data-driven decisions with unprecedented efficiency.”
Unique Data Advantage: Adthena’s unparalleled, proprietary data set provides Ask Arlo with a unique and comprehensive understanding of the competitive landscape. Arlo can answer complex questions about market share, competitor performance, ad copy and insights across all markets.
Intuitive Conversational Interface: Receive clear, concise answers and summarize data for quick understanding or delve deeper into specific areas.
Instantaneous Insights: Eliminate time wasted on generating and interpreting reports. With analysis time reduced from weeks to seconds, customers can focus their time on strategic action.
Visual Clarity: Gain a deeper understanding of complex data with easy-to-understand, bespoke charts and graphs.
Streamlined Efficiency: Reduce reliance on customer support to keep marketing campaigns optimized. Troubleshoot issues or identify areas for improvement instantly.
“The search landscape is evolving at an unprecedented pace, and many enterprise advertisers feel they’re operating in the dark with a lack of transparency from Google.” says Phillip Thune, CEO of Adthena. “Ask Arlo empowers users to unlock valuable performance and strategic insights directly within their search data – instantly. Alpha customers are raving about its ability to simplify complex data analysis and deliver actionable recommendations in seconds.”
Adthena is a multi-award-winning search intelligence platform that leverages artificial intelligence to empower global brands, marketers, and agencies to navigate the complexities of digital advertising and dominate their competitive landscapes.
Social Media Marketing:
An Interview with Andrew Jenkins, Chief Executive Officer, Volterra
Andrew Jenkins is a leading expert on social media marketing and the author of “Social Media Marketing for Business”.
STEPHEN SHAW is the Chief Strategy Officer of Kenna, a marketing solutions provider specializing in delivering a more unified customer experience. He is also the host of the Customer First Thinking podcast. Stephen can be reached via e-mail at sshaw@kenna.ca
BY STEPHEN SHAW
We are nearly two decades now into the social media era — time enough to assess its net impact on society at large.
The harms of social media are well known. The social divisiveness. The rampant spread of misinformation — of toxic content — of rage bait. The undermining of traditional media. Blatant privacy violations. The atrophying of attention spans. And worst of all, the insidious effect on the mental well-being of youth whose epidemic levels of depression and anxiety compelled the U.S. Surgeon General to call for a warning label on social media. Social media it turns out is not that social.
While social media has failed to live up to the Pollyanna hopes of its early proponents — who once hailed it as a liberating force for free speech — it has made it easier for people to connect with each other. There are, after all, five billion users around the globe spending a good part of their day on social media. It has become an integral part of everyday life. In some parts of the world, it is the only way for people to message one
another. Pick a subject — a hobby — a pet peeve — and you will find a niche group or community who share the same passion. It has enabled social activists to organize. It has helped expose corporate chicanery. And, as Canadian grocery giant Loblaw recently found out to its chagrin, it can facilitate nationwide consumer boycotts.
From the start businesses have understood the importance of having a presence in social media, viewing it as a natural channel to reach potential customers at a fraction of the cost of a standard media buy. Today more money is being diverted into social media advertising than ever before, eclipsing every other media option. Where companies have struggled, however, is using social media in the way it was intended — to conduct a two-way dialogue with people. Brands still use social media largely as a “buy now” promotional tool. And while most businesses are spending on average up to 20 percent of their marketing budget on social media, nobody is ever able to prove conclusively that greater social engagement turns into actual sales, no matter how
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many followers they may have. Social media teams continue to operate as junior partners in marketing, staffed by entry-level employees who are viewed by their bosses as overhead.
Today social media is at a cross-roads. The platforms are under pressure to make their platforms safer. People have become wiser to its addictive properties — its algorithmic manipulations. Others are becoming more protective of their personal data which is the lifeblood of the walled garden platforms. Legislators are tightening their restrictions on data use and clamping down on the freeloading of content sourced from mainstream media. TikToc has upended the playing field with its Svengali-like algorithm. And just beginning to take shape is this alternative concept called the “fediverse” built on an entirely different protocol which allows users to own their own data and share content without having to create multiple identities and accounts.
As social media evolves, maybe to eventually become a private decentralized ad-free network, businesses will have to adapt and respond, recognizing that we are long past the incubation stage of social media. They will be forced to make a far greater commitment to it as the primary means of connecting with people. But to do so successfully, argues the longtime social media expert Andrew Jenkins, they will have to focus on generating better content to rise about the noise and put greater effort into building engaged communities. They will, in fact, have to make social media more social.
In his book “Social Media Marketing for Business” Jenkins lays out a practical step-by-step blueprint for implementing and scaling an effective social media strategy. The Founder and CEO of a social media management outsourcing service, he has been active in social media for most of his career, and is widely recognized as one of the world’s a leading authorities on the subject.
STEPHEN SHAW: How did you get your start in social media?
ANDREW JENKINS: In 2008 the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts in the UK brought me on as a consultant to conduct research on all of the predominant social platforms at that time. Nesta is very similar to MARS here in Toronto — it facilitates collaboration between academia, the private sector and the public sector. So basically I got paid to become an expert on social media. And then I just incorporated that expertise into my consulting and strategy practice.
Over the years I got increasingly frustrated with strategy engagements where clients struggled to operationalize my social media recommendations. And so after a while I began to ask clients if they’d like to outsource the work to my company. And that is now the bulk of our business. We just focus on social media management — the clients outsource to us.
SHAW: We’ve seen a ton of change over those 15 years. How would you describe the state of social media today relative to those early, more hopeful days?
JENKINS: Well, because that was back in 2008, I have to remind people that the number one social platform then was MySpace — it wasn’t Facebook. Today Facebook is 2.5 billion users. Instagram is only a decade old, roughly — today it has the highest organic engagement. So yeah, a lot has changed, dramatically. You and I are both old enough to remember the final episode of MASH. That had a viewing audience of 100 million people, and you couldn’t record it, so you watched it when it aired. The final episode of the American version of The Office, when it aired on NBC, was 6 million. But once it moved to Netflix, you could binge watch on any device, far surpassing MASH in viewers. And so the way we consume content has shifted dramatically.
As social media evolves, maybe to eventually become a private decentralized ad-free network, businesses will have to adapt and respond.
SHAW: That’s the challenge, isn’t it? Part of the stigma around social media has been its obsession with vanity metrics, as you’re pointing out, and the inability to ladder up to the measures that senior management actually cares about. Are you drawn into building the financial justification for investment in social media?
JENKINS: Well, I can show them why social media should be part of their marketing mix. But I’m also very transparent with them. I will tell them, social media is not your salvation. It should not be your sole marketing effort. And so the way we approach it is to say, let’s talk about your corporate objectives. What’s your focus for the next six months? How will you be measured? Oh, we’re focused on brand awareness. Oh, we’re focused on thought leadership. Oh, we’re focused on lead generation. And then I look at where and how social media can complement those objectives. Social media should be an overlay to what the company’s doing versus trying to bend the company’s will to social media.
I like to talk about the three Cs of social media ROI. The first C is community, and that includes fans and followers. We want to leverage that community to extend the reach of our content. You want them to be engaged, you want to build rapport and potentially a dialogue, and there will be a subset of your community who are highly engaged and more likely to amplify your content. The second C is content. We want to show over time that the content we produced is performing well in terms of engagement. And then the third C is conversion. We want to show the referral traffic to the website driven by social. We’re sending people to the website to read a blog, to listen to a podcast, to register for a webinar, to sign up for your newsletter, or to fill out a contact form because they want sales to contact them.
SHAW: How well is social media understood all these years later by senior marketing management?
JENKINS: The biggest misunderstanding is they tend to conflate the way they use social with the way their target audience uses it. I have to remind them, you are not your customer. And I use myself as an example. I personally don’t spend a lot of time on Instagram. I don’t find it a particularly interesting platform. That being said, every one of our clients should be on it, and I can give them all the data to support why. You have to look at each of the platforms individually and at what content and what approach best serves the use of those channels. And the last thing I’ll say is, many of them still fall back on vanity metrics. They judge a lot of things by the number of likes and followers. They need to be looking deeper into the stats and validate that their content is resonating with the target audience.
SHAW: Part of the challenge is that for too long social media was treated as this standalone department. And what you’re saying is that social media really permeates every aspect of marketing today.
JENKINS: It should! Social needs a seat at the table. When we’re talking to clients and they’ve got staff going to an event, it’s foreign for them to start thinking about, oh, this could be social media content. And we’ve shown them, when you have a picture of one of your senior leaders on stage, it gets a lot of engagement. It doesn’t have to be an Annie Leibovitz-quality picture either. It can be from your phone. Don’t get hung up on production value. People are more intrigued with the immediacy of your content than the production value.
SHAW: Let’s talk about the integration of social media into businesses. And one of the points in your book is it can be a big drain on time and resources. Content generation alone is relentless. Is that why a lot of companies
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just choose to outsource the work? Is that the preferred model today?
JENKINS: It’s a spectrum. So we have some clients who just hand over the keys and are quite comfortable saying, run with it, just keep me in the loop, because they’re busy doing their thing. And then we have the other end of the spectrum — for example, financial services where nothing goes out that they haven’t touched or seen. Now, we might still do the scheduling, but everything is usually done days and weeks ahead, usually weeks. The content is planned, the calendar is planned, the posts are designed. And for other clients, we provide advisory support and analytics. So it can be anywhere along that spectrum.
Many of our clients have digital marketing resources in place, but they’re doing a million different things. Social is always on. Unless you’re a big retailer, you’re probably not sending out an email every day to a newsletter list. You’re not building a new website every day, you’re not rejigging your SEO every day. And those are all of critical importance. But social is the only one of the digital marketing realms that is on every single day and that demands a constant stream of content.
SHAW: One of the sobering truths in your book is just the complexity of it all. If a company chooses not to outsource, who should own social media? Where does it properly belong?
JENKINS: It depends on the size of the organization. When I was at Royal Bank social media sat in the enterprise brand and communication group. But every business unit was autonomous. So you ended up with a dog’s breakfast of social accounts — no coordination of efforts between business units — and that can detract from the brand. And so the organization has to decide, do you want to be a mile wide and a foot deep? I tend to recommend forming, whether literally or loosely, a steering committee. I had a consulting engagement with a direct to consumer organization and I asked when it was over: Who owns this after I’m gone? And it was one of the longest, most awkward silences, because there are some people who see it as their chance to soar, and others go, no, I’m not sticking my neck out. It highlights one of the things that’s the most overlooked aspects of an organization when it comes to social media success, and that’s culture.
And so if everyone’s rowing in the same direction, wanting the company to succeed, that’s probably going to cascade into a more collaborative approach to social. But you can also have organizations where you’ve got disparate silos working at cross purposes in social, where they’re almost at war with each other. And what ends up happening is their audience gets mixed messages. You have duplication of effort, you have the wrong content going out at the wrong time, or just an absolute ton of missed opportunities as well.
Many of our clients have digital marketing resources in place, but they’re doing a million different things. Social is always on.
SHAW: In the final few pages of your book, I’ll quote you here, “Hopefully by the time you read this we have moved beyond the polarization we have witnessed and experienced and returned to business as usual”. But it seems to me, going back to my question about the state of social media, that polarization in social media is business as usual. How do businesses insulate themselves from it?
JENKINS: Well, you raise an interesting point, because we could not have predicted recent events, like October 7th in Israel and Gaza. I use that as an example, because now individuals and organizations are being drawn into the discussion, whether they want to or not.
SHAW: They’re being asked to take sides. JENKINS: Yes and there’s no easy answer. Anytime someone has an issue, and they bring it to a brand, the first step is to acknowledge it and say, we hear you, we understand that you have an issue.
We did some work with a financial services company where the CEO of the company happened to be Jewish. A member of the staff was posting pro-Palestinian content on their personal Facebook page, which was their right to do. But their personal Facebook account was not locked down — it was open and visible to the public, and therefore potentially visible to clients. So, this brings up the importance of having social media policies and rules of engagement. We often advise companies to put down what you will allow on your social media accounts. You can say what you will allow and what you won’t allow and where and how you’re willing to engage in a dialogue. Unfortunately, in this heightened era of polarization, you can no longer sit on the sidelines. Inevitably you will
be drawn in. And so you have to be prepared to state your corporate position. But increasingly the younger generation are looking at how transparent organizations are with their values. And so if you are not aligned with their values, they have no interest in working for you.
SHAW: Or potentially buying your products. Speaking of Gen Z, I’m going to move on to TikTok. It’s obviously been a massive game changer. We know the U.S. is now trying to force it’s sale or even banishment. How has it permanently altered the landscape of social media? And if it does disappear — it’s got this whole generation of Gen Z’ers hooked on it — what takes its place?
JENKINS: The pandemic was instrumental in its growth. There was a hashtag called “Moms of TikTok”. Women at home with children, whether they were stay at home moms or they were working moms, but now at home, because of the pandemic, having to do a multitude of things all at the same time. That hashtag exploded to a community of billions — the usage was astronomical. It was one of the largest single communities on TikTok because women during the pandemic wanted to find a supportive community. And now there’s, “Book TikTok” — there’s “Film TikTok”. All these distinct communities.
When I grew up, my father had horses, so I know what a blacksmith is, and I know what shoeing a horse is all about. The proper word for blacksmith is “farrier”. And so there is a “Farrier TikTok”. Tons of videos of blacksmiths or farriers shoeing horses, or there’s vets working on the infected hoof of a cow. And some of these videos are getting hundreds of thousands of views. You couldn’t have said to me five years ago, you’re going to watch a video of a blacksmith shoeing a horse and find it fascinating. But that just speaks to how well this unique platform is giving you more and more of what you want.
Now, because of that outsized influence, and because it’s not controlled or regulated by the U.S. government like the others are, politics is infusing itself into the situation. And because the government can’t control the message, it concerns them. Both the prospective Republican nominee and the Democratic nominee — I’m just using U.S. examples — are on the platform because they recognize if you’re trying to reach Gen Z, you have to be on TikTok, hands down, because that’s where they get their news. There is a TikTok account called “Under the Desk News” that has 5 million followers. They’re getting their news, they’re consuming their content, on TikTok. Cable news shows are getting half a million viewers, live. But their six minute summary clip on TikTok is getting viewed a million times.
SHAW: Yeah, it’s crazy. Facebook has been looking enviously over at TikTok’s meteoric rise and wondering what it can steal. It created Reels
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out of the gate as a response. But interestingly, they’ve also done something else recently. Apparently they’ve altered their algorithm to deemphasize friends and family content in favour of content more broadly based on user preference and interests. In other words, they’re taking their cue from TikTok. What’s your perspective on where Facebook is headed?
JENKINS: It’s the TikTok effect. My 24-year old daughter and I have similar interests and similar senses of humour. We’re constantly finding that we’re sending the same TikToks back to each other because we respond to many of the same things. But it just never ceases to amaze us how two different people, two different genders, two different age demographics, etcetera, can have the same platform serving up similar content to us. It just speaks to the amazing algorithm that they have. And this has forced Facebook, or Meta more broadly, to not just respond on Facebook, but to respond in the same way on Instagram too.
If you’re starting a Facebook page today, you’re going to need to have funds set aside for paid to get your page off the ground. Starting a page organically now on Facebook is nearly impossible for visibility. Having said that, if you are doing paid, it is one of the most cost effective platforms with high potential reach. If you’re trying to reach someone over 40, that’s going to be Facebook. But if you’re trying to reach a Gen Z, who’s university age, it’s Instagram and TikTok. Someone who is in their mid-thirties, who’s into fashion and beauty and travel, probably Instagram with a bit of TikTok. And then one of the surprising things, LinkedIn, is under 30, because GenZ is recognizing that they have to have visibility, they have to network.
SHAW: Let’s move on to X, formerly known as Twitter. It’s been in freefall through selfinflicted wounds. How do you see its fate playing out over the next few years?
JENKINS: Twitter was my favorite platform. It was where I got my news, where I got my information. This is before TikTok. I saw some of the most thought provoking, interesting stuff come there, and some of the funniest stuff, too. But then Elon bought it. And in some ways, Elon’s a genius, and in some ways, he’s an absolute idiot who should not be running a media company. I mean, some of the things he did to people, staff, just absolutely inhumane and disrespectful. Just shooting from the hip with no thought to the repercussions. But, as much as we say, oh, he’s running it into the ground, the day that the guilty verdicts about Donald Trump were announced, where was the largest engagement? Where does news still break to this day? Twitter.
SHAW: Because there’s no real alternative at this point, is there?
JENKINS: We do a lot of social media listening. And Twitter, or X, continues to be the proxy for all the other platforms. But engagement is
down, usage is down. We were asked by a client in the healthcare space to grow their following on Twitter. The healthcare industry in Canada is bigger on Twitter than it is on Instagram. We were following doctors and physicians who had been active in the last 90 days, and they weren’t following back at all. We were left scratching our heads going, what is happening on Twitter?
So, I remain hopeful that someone will take the keys away from Elon. But he continues to operate erratically. He re-shared content about transgender transition surgery. And it turned out that the source was a hate group posing as a pediatric organization. Nobody looked close enough. So, if the CEO’s sharing misinformation, what hope do we have?
One of the interesting things about Perplexity is you can actually point it solely at Reddit. Instead of sifting through all the disparate Communities.
banned the producers of the post.
JENKINS: To your point, they have tried to put in some community standards that you as a moderator have to adhere to or your community isn’t going to exist anymore.
To tie this into AI, there’s a solution called Perplexity that competes now with Google. Perplexity calls itself an answer engine. And so you can use it to conduct research. But one of the interesting things about Perplexity is you can actually point it solely at Reddit. Instead of sifting through all the disparate communities on Reddit, I can use Perplexity to extract more value. The reason I want to tie it back to your mentioning of Reddit, I’m wondering if something like Perplexity, working in conjunction with Reddit, will increase its usefulness to people.
SHAW: I want to ask you about the “fediverse”, which a lot of people scratch their heads over. Do you believe it’s genuine alternative to the centralized platforms? And I ask that because even Zuckerberg has said, quote, “a privacy focused communications platform will become even more important than today’s open platforms”.
JENKINS: Say you wanted to use Midjourney2 You have to have a Discord account. So you have to figure out how to navigate into Midjourney via Discord. Well, if you want adoption, you have to remove as much friction as possible. And I have to educate people just to the advantages and strengths of being federated. It also means my community is going to be capped at whatever a server can manage. Well, most of my money and time will be spent on infrastructure. So, why? So users feel better because they’re federated? Organizations are struggling to just manage the volume of activity related to social media. Now I’ve got to be monitoring a number of Discord servers, Mastodon, whatever? Good lord. To what end?
SHAW: Content moderation has been the bane of existence for many social media platforms. I’m thinking of Nextdoor as an example. But Reddit, after being home to the very worst of humanity for a long time, straightened it out through proper governance. What lessons do they have to offer to some of the other platforms?
JENKINS: In order to go public, they had to get it under control. But this speaks to a broader issue, and some will remember Tumblr. Tumblr had tons of pornography on it, which fed into its engagement and user base, which fed its valuation. Then Yahoo buys it, and a publicly traded company can’t be peddling porn, so it had to purge a lot of the objectionable material. Once it did, Tumblr got bought later for just a few million dollars. So Reddit had to purge a lot of the objectionable communities.
SHAW: They actually went after those groups and banned them, purged them from the system. They didn’t just purge the posts, they
SHAW: Certainly the complexity issue is a big barrier, at least at this point.
JENKINS: Mastodon has been around for a while, like five, eight years, maybe even a decade, but not to any degree of popularity. One of the things that held it back from mass adoption was this whole federated mechanism. I think back to Second Life. The amount of things you had to go through was a ridiculously high barrier to joining. But once you were on and found your like-minded people there, it was magic. I could fly from one community to another. I could be whatever I wanted. But then I was anonymous too, and so I wasn’t that trustworthy. So again, it goes back to every platform has its nuances and its strengths and its weaknesses.
1. Nesta (formerly NESTA, National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts) is an independent charity that works to increase the innovation capacity of the UK.
2. Midjourney is an artificial intelligence program that is used for creating images using prompts. At present, this AI program is only accessible using
MARKETING RESEARCH
BY OLGA SAVELO
IWhat a New Study Teaches Us About Email Marketing Performance
n the U.S., Email remains the dominant outbound marketing channel with a 78 percent usage rate, and industryspecific benchmarks reveal key trends and performance insights. The Canadian market has always shown similar numbers, which means the new study by Selzy provides a reasonable guideline for Canadian firms. The comprehensive analysis of email marketing performance across various industries. By examining over 40 billion emails sent by Selzy users between 2020 and 2024, the research uncovers trends, effectiveness, and industry-specific benchmarks that are crucial for marketers to understand.
The study indicates that email marketing continues to be a pivotal tool for businesses, with an increase in adoption and performance metrics across most industries. Data from the study highlights how different sectors are leveraging email marketing, and what trends are emerging as crucial for success.
Key Findings:
❯ Dominance of Email Marketing: Email maintains its position as the leading channel for outbound marketing, with a 78 percent usage rate, reflecting a 15 percent increase over the past year.
Inside the Selzy Study and Beyond
❯ Deliverability Rates: Average deliverability rates have improved, rising from 94.26 percent in 2020 to 96.43 percent in 2024. The Tourism & Travel and Nonprofit sectors lead with rates exceeding 98 percent.
❯ Bounce Rates: The overall average bounce rate was 1.98 percent, with the Marketing, E-commerce, and Media & Publishing industries experiencing the highest bounce rates.
❯ E-commerce Growth: The e-commerce industry saw the most significant improvement in deliverability rates, with a 10.28 percent increase, alongside a 0.7 percent reduction in bounce rates.
❯ Open Rates Trends: Despite a slight decline in total open rates (-8.6 percent) since 2020, there has been a notable increase (17.8 percent) between 2021 and 2023. Media & Publishing
observed a substantial growth of 60.8 percent following a dip in 2021.
❯ Unsubscribe Rates: In 2023, unsubscribe rates significantly decreased in the Education and Marketing sectors by 35 percent and 35.7 percent, respectively.
❯ Spam Rates: The overall spam rate saw a notable reduction of 44.4 percent in 2023 compared to 2020, indicating improved email practices across industries.
The key to email marketing success
This report compared email performance rates. By looking at different industries over the past four years (2020-2023), we found out something important: understanding how users behave is really important for success.
Benchmarks are a good starting point. The next step is to watch trends and figure out what depends on what. You need to always be paying attention to how user behavior changes because of things like the economy and world events. These small and fast-changing trends can be hard to keep up with.
To stay ahead of the curve, data is your most valuable tool. Using data analytics, businesses can find out what customers want and adapt to their changing preferences. You can get real-time insights and keep track of bigger trends that might influence user behavior.
Using data and being flexible, you can make a dynamic email marketing system that connects with your audience and gets consistent results.
The research analyzed over 40 billion marketing emails sent by Selzy users from 2020 to 2024. Industry averages from different sources were also reviewed, focusing on sectors where Selzy has sufficient data to make reliable conclusions. The study evaluated email performance trends over the 2020-2024 period, providing a thorough understanding of how email marketing has evolved.
To present a comprehensive picture of email performance across different industries, public data from 2023 and Selzy’s data from 2020 to 2024 were utilized. The analysis included industry and business reports,
MARKETING RESEARCH
along with research from respected sources like Statista, Litmus, Accenture, Grand View Research, and academic journals. This combination of data and expert insights offers valuable recommendations for improving email marketing strategies across various industries.
It is important to note that these are average metrics. The success of an email campaign can vary significantly based on factors such as domain reputation, quality of contact lists, email content, and more. Additionally, differences in data collection methods among publications may have influenced the findings.
Benchmarks are your compass to navigate email marketing To gain a competitive advantage, industry, and regional benchmarks continuously come in handy to analyze email marketing effectiveness within the broader landscape.
Benchmarks provide performance guidelines: Improvement areas identification and progress tracking against industry best practices and specific nuances over time.
Realistic goals and strategy refinements to stay competitive in the ever-evolving digital marketing.
Decisions based on regional and industry customer preferences to increase engagement and conversions.
Targeted adjustments to the strategy with metrics comparison (open rates, click-through rates, etc.) to industry averages and standards.
To get a leg up on the competition, industry and regional benchmarks are really useful for figuring out how well your email marketing is doing compared to the bigger picture.
Benchmarks help you: Figure out where you can improve and track your progress compared to the best practices in your industry and any unique things that change over time. Set realistic goals and adjust your strategies to stay ahead in the constantly changing world of digital marketing.
Make decisions based on
what customers in your area and industry like to do so you can get more people involved and make more sales.
Change your strategy based on how your metrics compare (open rates, click-through rates, etc.) to the average and standards in your industry.
Email is still a powerful tool when used with other marketing efforts. Email makes up over 80 percent of outbound messaging.
(Salesforce)
Delivery or deliverability?
Delivery rate ( percent) = (Delivered emails / Total emails sent) x 100; Deliverability rate ( percent) = Delivery rate - Spam rate and Bounce rate
While both provide information on how your emails are getting to people, there’s a big difference between email delivery rate and email deliverability rate. Email delivery rate shows if an email was sent successfully from the sender to the recipient’s mail server. It
Customers say email is their favorite way to interact with brands. 56 percent of Gen Z use email to talk to brands, and they’re keeping up with other generations.
(Data Axle)
doesn’t say if the email went to the inbox, spam folder, or somewhere else. Email deliverability rate looks at the whole email journey. It checks if the recipient’s server took the email and where it ended up in
Email remains the preferred channel for brand interaction Because email is still important and reliable, it’s really important to look at your email marketing strategy and make it better so you can succeed for a long time.
your emails reach inboxes and avoid spam filters. Deliverability has a direct impact on audience engagement.
Why is deliverability important?
Deliverability problems can cost more than $15,000 for every million emails sent according to Validity. Getting to the inbox makes it more likely that people will see and interact with emails, leading to more engagement. Over time, consistently good deliverability builds a good reputation as a sender, which is very important for email marketing success.
Challenges and considerations:
Email service providers like Yahoo and Gmail are always coming up with new ways to fight spam. This means you need to pay close attention to the requirements for validating your domain and avoid things that trigger spam filters when you’re setting up your emails and making content. Deliverability and delivery rates can change depending on the Email Service Provider (ESP) (e.g., Selzy, HubSpot, etc.) and the Internet Service Provider (ISP) that the recipients use.
A good deliverability score indicates your emails reach inboxes and avoid spam filters. Deliverability has a direct impact on audience engagement.
Bounce rates are increasing. Is it consistent across industries? Email bounce rate is the percentage of emails that weren’t delivered. It helps you understand if there are problems stopping your communication efforts.
Bounces happen when emails get sent back to the sender because of delivery problems. There are two main types of bounces: hard and soft.
Soft bounces:
Cause: Temporary problems, like full inboxes, server problems, inactive accounts, and temporary emails.
the recipient’s inbox. While both terms relate to getting your emails to recipients, there’s a critical distinction between email delivery rate and email deliverability rate. A good deliverability score means
Outcome: The email isn’t delivered right away but might be delivered later.
Impact: This can hurt the sender’s reputation if it’s not fixed or if it happens often. These issues
MARKETING RESEARCH
might fix themselves, but you should keep an eye on them to fix problems quickly. For example, if emails are sent too often, or files are too big.
Hard bounces:
Cause: Permanent problems, like invalid email addresses, domain names, or authentication failures.
Outcome: The email can’t be delivered permanently and won’t be delivered.
Impact: Hurts the sender’s reputation and can cause more problems with email deliverability.
Benchmarking bounce rates: Comparing industry averages, 2020-2023
According to Selzy, bounce rates went down a little by 0.4 percent, going from 5.68 percent in 2020 to 3.55 percent in 2023. The E-commerce and Retail industries saw the biggest improvement in bounce rates of 0.7 percent from 2020 to 2023. In 2023, Agencies/ Consulting had the biggest increase of +144,7 percent in bounces, followed by IT with +82.6 percent. Tourism & Travel and E-commerce, on the other hand, were the only two industries showing a decrease in bounce rates. Tourism & Travel is down by 25.8 percent from 2022, E-commerce -28.4 percent from 2022
The average bounce rate across all industries is 1.98 percent. Looking at the average bounce rates for each industry shows that Marketing and Tourism & Travel have the highest average bounce rates. In contrast, Nonprofits, Education, and E-commerce have the lowest.
Marketing (97 percent),
E-commerce (93 percent) and Media & Publishing (93 percent) have the highest percentage of soft bounces against the overall rate.
Several things might cause this, including:
Email practices specific to each industry. Different industries might have set frequencies and strategies for reaching out through email,
because of temporary problems.
Soft bounce rate by industry Overall, this benchmark shows that soft bounces happen more often than hard bounces, which is good news. The bad news is bounce rates go up over time. Tourism & Travel and E-commerce are the industries to learn from.
Beyond the averages: Exploring email open rates with industry comparisons & unique insights. Email open rate = (Emails opened / Emails delivered) x 10.
The email open rate is the first sign of how engaged people are with your email marketing efforts. It tells you what percentage of delivered emails were opened. This metric shows you how many recipients were interested in your message. Open rates give you useful insights, but there are some key things to keep in mind:
❯ Multiple opens from the same subscriber or pre-loading of images because of Apple Mail Privacy Protection (MPP) can make the open rate data seem bigger than it really is.
which could affect bounce rates.
The demographics of the target audience. The age, location, and how tech-savvy the target audience is can affect email engagement and bounce rates.
How well the email list is managed. Industries that are stricter about keeping their lists clean might have lower overall bounce rates, with soft bounces being more likely to happen
❯ Open rates make more sense when you look at them along with other metrics like clickthrough rates and conversion rates. This gives you a better picture of how your campaign is doing.
❯ Dividing your audience based on their preferences and demographics can make open rates much better. Research by Mailchimp shows that segmented campaigns have 14.31 percent more opens compared to ones that aren’t segmented. (Mailchimp)
❯ A recent Mailpro study showed
MARKETING RESEARCH
that automated emails led to open rates of 51.36 percent.
(Mailpro)
Industry open rates
Open rates across all industries have been trending upwards, with an average increase of 7.6 percent from 2020 to 2023.
The Agencies/Consulting industry is in the lead with the biggest average growth in open rates at 8.1 percent over the four-year period. This is interesting considering the bounce rate problems we saw before.
The data suggests that open rates might be recovering after the COVID-19 shock of 2021. This is clear in the growth we saw in 2022 and 2023, with an overall 36.5 percent increase.
Media & Publishing had the biggest positive change of 50.6 percent from 2021, followed by E-commerce (+38.1 percent) and IT (+33.1 percent).
Open rate dynamics, 2020-2023
The overall open rate is still useful as a measure of engagement, but it’s important to look at it along with the unique open rate to get a more accurate idea of how each subscriber is behaving. Also, multiple opens aren’t necessarily bad. They might mean someone is really interested in your content.
Click-through rate = (Unique clicks) / (Delivered emails). Looking beyond initial engagement, the email clickthrough rate (CTR) goes deeper, showing what percentage of recipients clicked on a link in your delivered emails. The CTR shows how many recipients were interested enough to click and learn more after opening your message.
The CTR gives you useful insights:
Looking at benchmarks from different platforms, the overall average open rate is 30.07 percent. Nonprofits are in the lead with an open rate of 34.89 percent, while Marketing has the lowest open rate at 21.65 percent.
Uncovering the value of unique open rates
Building on the overall open rate, the unique open rate is a more accurate way to measure how engaged each recipient is. It gets rid of duplicate counts by counting each unique recipient’s interaction with your email only once, no matter how many times they open it.
A high CTR means that recipients found the email content relevant and interesting enough to click and explore further.
A strong CTR suggests that your call to action (CTA) is clear, effective, and placed in a way that encourages recipients to do what you want.
Research by Mailchimp shows that segmented email campaigns can outperform campaigns that aren’t targeted by 100.95 percent in terms of CTR. (Mailchimp) Dividing your audience into groups, tailoring content, and using CTAs can greatly boost engagement and click-through rates.
Industry benchmarks CTR dynamics through 2020-2023
Generally, open rates decreased by 8.6 percent over the four-year period, declining from 1.52 percent in 2020 to 1.39 percent in 2023. Overall, open rates went down by 8.6 percent over the four-year period, going from 1.52 percent in 2020 to 1.39 percent in 2023.
Looking at the period from 2021 to 2023 suggests that rates are also increasing, with +17.8 percent in 3 years.
In 2021 Media & Publishing open rates were affected the most (-1.7 percent), however, it experienced 60.8 percent growth from 2022 to 2023. Education stands out as its
open rates have been continuously declining from 2020, -33,8 percent in 4 years.
In 2023 Media & Publishing, Nonprofits, and Retail were the top industries in click-through rates, with 3.65 percent, 3.08 percent, and 2.51 percent respectively. Marketing (0.67 percent) and Education (0.92 percent) were the lowest performing.
Our cross-platform industry benchmark shows 2.14 percent as the click-through rate average. Media & Publishing is in the lead for CTR across industries with an average of 4.22 percent, followed by Nonprofits with 3.33 percent. Marketing and E-commerce have the lowest CTR averages of 1.61 percent and 1.99 percent consistently.
Unveiling unsubscribe rate stats The Unsubscribe rate is the percentage of unsubscribes per delivery. The unsubscribe rate is the percentage of recipients who choose to opt out of your email list per delivered email, which can be good and bad. Unsubscription might seem like a bad thing at first, but you can still learn a lot from unsubscribe data. It’s normal to lose some people naturally. For example, businesses that target parents of young children might see people unsubscribe naturally as their target audience’s needs change. If you see a big jump in unsubscribes or complaints for specific emails or periods, it means you need to take action right away.
Research by Mailgun shows the top 3 reasons for unsubscribes:
Comparing unsubscribe rates across industries, 2020-2023
The overall average unsubscribe rate went down by 26.32 percent over the past 4 years. The industries with the lowest unsubscribe rates in 2023 were Marketing (0.09 percent) and Media & Publishing (0.11 percent). In 2023 Education (-35 percent) and Marketing (-35.7 percent) saw the biggest drop in unsubscribe rates. In Agencies/Consulting and IT industries, unsubscribe rates went up the most in 2023 by 26.7 percent and 13.3 percent. In 2023 the overall unsubscribe rate average was 0.14 percent. The top 3 industries with the highest average unsubscribe rate:
❯ Architecture – 0.74 percent
❯ E-commerce – 0.55 percent
❯ Marketing – 0.52 percent
Top 3 industries with the lowest unsubscribe rate:
❯ Nonprofits – 0.21 percent
❯ IT – 0.23 percent
❯ Tourism & Travel – 0.23 percent
Understanding spam rates: Industry standards and comparison
Spam rate covers a crucial aspect – avoiding the spam folder. It indicates the percentage of recipients who mark emails as spam. Having emails marked as spam can be bad for email marketing efforts, affecting engagement, how much people trust your brand, and deliverability. Over 70 percent of consumers check their spam folders to see if important emails are missing, and almost 33 percent find it annoying when they find emails from brands in their spam folders. Ten percent of consumers lose trust in brands whose emails go to spam, which can make them unsubscribe. Almost 20 percent of consumers say they mark unwanted emails as spam, which can make mailbox providers take action against your sender’s reputation. ( Mailgun)
Navigating spam folder: Spam rate by industry benchmarks, 2020-2023
The overall spam rate in 2023 was 0.05 percent, which is 44.4 percent lower than in 2020 when it was 0.09 percent. Education and Nonprofits saw the biggest decrease in spam rates in 2023, going down by 33.3 percent and 25 percent, while in Media & Publishing, spam rates went up by 33.3 percent. Media & Publishing has been having trouble with spam rates since 2021, with the industry’s spam rates doubling in three years.
E-commerce and Tourism & Travel spam rates stayed the same over four years at 0.04 percent and 0.03 percent. Agencies/ Consulting’s spam rate was also pretty stable at 0.1 percent, but the industry is at risk because the spam rate should be below 0.1 percent.
After analyzing email benchmarks from Selzy and GetResponse, we found that the average overall spam rate is 0.03 percent. The lowest spam rate averages across industries were at 0.02 percent in four business sectors:
❯ Retail
❯ Travel & Tourism
❯ Nonprofits
❯ Marketing
Agencies & Consulting with 3.04 percent and Architecture with 2,93 percent have the highest spam rate averages across industries.
email acquisition, and the power of creativity.
Securing your reputation: Email authentication and spam policies
Mailbox providers measure how good your domain is. The better your reputation is, the more email
If a spam rate goes up a lot, mailbox providers will quarantine or block the messages. Even legitimate emails sent to real customers and subscribers who opted in earlier could end up in spam. In 2024, Gmail and Yahoo said they’ll start using spam complaint thresholds. People who send out a lot of emails need to keep spam rates below 0.1 percent consistently and avoid having big jumps of 0.3 percent.
Essential best practices and recommendations to elevate email marketing
The main reason for this study was to understand how to make email marketing better all the time. In this research, we looked at average email performance rates by industry between 2020 and 2023. The main finding is that people’s behavior changes because of changes in the digital, economic, and geopolitical environment. Because people can access information more easily, behaviour changes quickly, and small trends can be confusing. To keep up with things now, you need a lot of data, to be able to change quickly, and to stay on top of global trends and new things that companies and governments are doing.
This section explores advanced strategies to improve email marketing including automation,
services trust emails coming from your domain and put them in recipients’ inboxes. The system of points awarded is kept secret for safety reasons.
Mailbox providers have analytical tools called postmasters. They analyze deliverability, spam complaints, IPs, and domain reputations. Gmail, Outlook, Yahoo, and each popular mailbox provider has its postmaster. One of the most popular ones is Google Postmaster Tools which analyzes emails sent into Gmail mailboxes. (Selzy)
Major email providers like Google and Yahoo are making sending requirements stricter to improve the user experience and security. While they were considered best practices before, several requirements have become mandatory since 2024: Email authentication: Use DKIM and DMARC protocols to verify your sender identity and stop people from pretending to be you.
“From” header compliance: Make sure the email address shown in the header matches your sending domain.
One-click unsubscribe: Include an easy and accessible unsubscribe option in every marketing email. Track and manage spam: Keep spam report rates below 0.3
percent to avoid getting filtered and having deliverability problems.
(Selzy)
2024 email authentication tips:
❯ Use a double opt-in process to reduce inactive and spam addresses on your list.
❯ Segment your audience based on how engaged they are so you can send them relevant content and keep a good sender reputation.
❯ Regularly remove inactive and low-engagement subscribers to make your email list better and improve deliverability.
❯ Combining authentication, anti-spam practices, and list management is essential for making your email campaigns work as well as possible.
Data-driven approach:
Analytics for winning email marketing strategies
It’s getting more and more complicated to create a winning email strategy. Nowadays, people have more freedom to change their careers and goals throughout their lives and, at the same time, face the most destructive economic events. Changing social values and economic challenges are making people want flexibility and the ability to adapt to a changing world. Relying just on demographic data like age, gender, and location isn’t enough anymore to predict what customers need and want. As people expect more personalized experiences, organizations need to adapt to this changing environment. Focusing on individuals and their journeys can lead to deeper engagement and better results.
Data has become the most important part of successful marketing strategies. The digital marketing software market was projected to have a 17.8 percent CAGR from 2020 to 2030 (Grand View Research). Useful insights from data analysis have gone from being a supporting element to being a mission-critical part of things.
Marketers are investing more in tools and technologies that combine data efficiently: Customer relationship management (CRM) platforms are used by 90 percent of marketers. Sixty-two percent of marketers have adopted artificial intelligence
(AI) to get insights from data and deliver personalized customer experiences on a large scale. Eighty-nine percent of B2B and B2B2C marketers use accountbased marketing platforms (ABM) to create targeted campaigns that work with sales and service teams. (Salesforce)
This gives brands the power to understand individual preferences and behavior better., send targeted messages at the right time and through the right channels and tailor content and offers for each recipient, which makes engagement and conversions better.
Also, research from Litmus shows the big advantages of using third-party analytics tools. Companies that use third-party analytics:
❯ 15 percent more likely to measure conversions compared to companies that don’t use them.
❯ Have a 47 percent better chance of getting revenue per subscriber.
❯ Have a 42 percent higher probability of tracking subscriber lifetime value.
These findings mean a higher return on investment (ROI). Companies that use third-party analytics have an average ROI of 45:1, compared to 36:1 for those who don’t. Marketers with these tools see a 25 percent higher ROI than those without them. Despite the benefits, many companies struggle to use data effectively. Almost half (47 percent) don’t track email interactions beyond opens and clicks. Less than 20 percent measure their email marketing ROI. Only 12 percent
track subscriber lifetime value. (Litmus).
Tips for data-driven email marketing strategy
Make decisions based on data. Explore third-party analytics platforms, CRM software with advanced reporting, and marketing automation solutions.
Watch key metrics: Don’t just track opens and clicks. Monitor conversions, revenue per subscriber, and subscriber lifetime value to maximize the impact of your campaigns and boost performance.
Train your team: Help your team get good at understanding and using data.
Collaborate: Ensure marketing and sales teams aim for the same goals and work together for a smooth customer experience. Companies that share email marketing results with all departments see a 28 percent higher ROI than those that don’t. (Litmus)
Making choices based on data and tech can dramatically change your email marketing efforts. Guessing isn’t an option anymore; a strategically driven powerhouse is the way to go. Data unlocks personalized experiences, boosts engagement, and gets better results.
Email marketing automation is growing rapidly
Building on the foundation of data-driven decision-making, here we look at how marketing automation makes email marketing even better. The global marketing automation industry is taking off and is expected to more
than double from 2023 to 2030. A lot of companies are realizing how great automation is. About 60 percent of marketing leaders across the world are planning to spend more on automation. (Statista) Almost all marketers (98 percent) say that marketing automation is a must for success. ( Adobe)
Automation has a lot of benefits, including:
❯ Making customer experience better.
❯ Helping staff work more efficiently.
❯ Getting better data and making better decisions.
❯ Boosting lead generation and making sure they stick around.
❯ Using the budget more wisely. (Mailmodo, Ascend2)
Email automation depends on data. 41 percent of email orders came from just 2 percent of automated emails in 2023. (Omnisend )
Automation isn’t just for e-commerce; it works in lots of different industries.
Healthcare: Sending reminders for appointments and info about meds. Finance: Personalized investment reports and fraud warnings. Education: Custom learning paths and progress reports. Travel & Hospitality: Emails about canceled reservations, flight confirmations, and personalized recommendations based on past trips. Nonprofits: Trigger emails to track donations, volunteer sign-up confirmations, and personalized performance reports based on donations.
Lands’ End used first-party data (email activity, purchase history, browsing behavior, product interests) to make 15+ personalized trigger emails. This program had a 158 percent higher conversion rate (purchase per email click) than the industry average. Lands’ End mixes data with testing to figure out the best message frequency and volume. (Data Axle)
Automation can help make things easier, save money and make customers loyal. Expanding your reach: Strategic email acquisition. Email acquisition helps you grow your email lists and reach new people. A lot of people think
Automated emails do way better than regular campaigns:
helps grow email lists and reach new audiences. Contrary to misconceptions, acquisition email is 100 percent compliant with current privacy laws when using reputable partners who ensure opt-in consent for third-party solicitations.
Source: Omnisend
you can’t use acquisition emails, but they’re totally legal when you use reputable partners who make sure people opt-in.
This is important because 23 percent of marketers didn’t know they could contact people not on their list via acquisition emails. (Data Axle)
campaigns better. When you use email with other channels, like social media, engagement rates go up by 20 percent. Adding data tools to email acquisition can make your marketing even more efficient. Haven Life did a marketing campaign with a lookalike audience based on their existing
Seventy-seven percent of marketers agree that acquisition emails give a higher return on investment. While 70 percent of marketers are focused on getting new customers, which shows how much potential email has. Combining email acquisition with other channels can make
customer data. They got 12 percent more quote forms completed and spent 23 percent less per lead than other platforms. (Data Axle) By using acquisition emails and data-driven strategies, you can reach new customers and make your brand more well-known. Email acquisition
make your email marketing more engaging and successful. Selzy is an ecosystem of marketing automation tools that helps small and medium businesses grow. The firm’s mission is to make intelligence-driven marketing technologies affordable and accessible to companies of all sizes and segments. They believe that every business deserves an equal opportunity to grow and to thrive.
OLGA AVELO is a seasoned researcher with 6+ years of experience. From neuroeconomics to user experience, and market research, it’s all been done. For the past year, she has embraced the digital nomad lifestyle, conducting research while traveling to new cities and immersing herself in diverse cultures. Automated
Think outside the box: Embracing creativity in crafting engaging email campaigns. It’s tough to get people’s attention. Just speaking their language isn’t enough, you need to be creative. Virality is powerful, but real creativity is about finding the right balance between standing out and making people feel comfortable. It’s always been hard to stand out from the crowd, but now it feels more important than ever. People want something new and interesting. No matter what industry you’re in, you need to get creative to stand out from the crowd.
Customers are used to boring stuff, so it’s a great chance for brands to do something different. But companies that focus on performance and budgets often don’t take creative risks. This can lead to lower-quality work that’s all about data, and not human imagination and touch. (Accenture). Many brands have sacrificed quality for speed, focusing on efficiency over creative impact. But bringing back craft, playfulness, and attention to detail will lead to long-term success.
Examples from the real world: Far Cry 6 email: Selzy’s blog talks about this unusual email that went viral on Reddit with 4.5k upvotes. It shows how creative approaches can be really powerful. (Selzy)
Brands like Jacquemus and Maybelline add fun elements to surprise and engage their audience. They make content that starts conversations and shows off their playful personalities.
Home security brand Ring used the “alien confirmation” news to have a contest to see who could capture aliens on their cameras. It shows how embracing disruptive things within your niche can lead to unexpected engagement and brand awareness. (We are social) Creativity doesn’t have to be over-the-top. It can be subtle, fun, or just unexpected. By taking calculated risks and experimenting with creative approaches, you can
Emojis — A Second Study
Digital communication lacks the subtleties of facial expressions and voice intonation, so it might sometimes seem too abstract. That’s where emojis come in — tiny symbols that infuse our messages with life and emotion and bridge the inherent emotional gap. They are an integral part of informal communication, emojis are even OK in the workplace now. So if emojis are such an established part of our lives and are even used in more formal communication, how effective are they in marketing, specifically, in email marketing? In this other research, we explore the evolution, impact, and occasional controversy surrounding emojis in email marketing, aiming to uncover the delicate balance between perception and effectiveness. We analyzed multiple business reports of market-leading companies, marketing research, and scientific publications, and added our own data to understand if emojis can enhance email marketing or do the opposite instead. Want to know more?
https://selzy.com/en/ benchmarks/emoji-research/
STATE OF INTELLIGENT INFORMATION MANAGEMENT
What Data-Driven Businesses Need to Know:
A Major New Study from the Association for Intelligent Information Management
INTRODUCTION: As a society, we are arguably amid a renaissance of technological advancement, driven by the progress sparked by generative AI. Yet, in this period of technical innovation, it’s key to remember that the success of technology is dependent on humans. AI is successful because it is developed and managed with human ingenuity, ethics, and context setting. For 15 years, AIIM has published regular market research on the state of the information management industry via its Industry Watch series. This year, we wanted to focus on the human drivers behind industry evolution. In this report, we specifically look at information management practitioners who are responsible for unstructured data to better understand the current and future states of the information management industry.
This report is designed to assess the current state of the information management industry and practice. For readers, this report provides an assessment of the current state of the information management industry, but also guidance on how to improve unstructured data management within your own organization.
This report explores the practice and practitioner of information management by highlighting three key areas:
1. The people who practice information management; 2. organizational perception of information management as a practice; and 3. the technology organizations and practitioners are using to advance information management.
The DAWN OF THE INFORMATION LEADER
BY ANNE CORNISH
The 2024 Industry Watch: State of the Practice Report reveals the emergence of the Information Leader, a critical role in navigating the complex landscape of unstructured data management. These professionals, armed with a diverse skill set and strategic vision, are increasingly recognized as influential figures within organizations, as evidenced by their rising seniority, decision-making authority, and compensation.
There are two types of data — structured and unstructured. Structured data is in a tabular format, like a database.
Unstructured data is nontabular and is data without a predefined data model. It goes by many names, like dark data, ugly data, or content. It’s the documents, invoices, contracts, images, videos, text
messages, social posts, and more.
At AIIM, we simply call that unstructured data “information.”
Importantly, information is vital for success with artificial intelligence (AI) and other emerging technologies. Think about generative AI applications, like ChatGPT, that use documents and text scaped from the internet.
High-quality unstructured data is vital to success with artificial intelligence (AI) and automation because it makes up a significant portion of all data generated; provides unique insights; and contributes to growth of large datasets required for AI models.
Information Management: A Universal Priority
This report also highlights the universal prioritization of information management across industries and organization
sizes. No longer confined to large, regulated entities, effective information management has become a crucial driver of success for businesses of all types and scales. Key motivators for investing in this practice include compliance and risk mitigation, digital transformation, and cost and productivity optimization. Organizations are actively seeking ways to integrate and customize information management within their unique structures and designs. Finally, this report sheds light on the evolving technology stack employed by information management practitioners. As the toolkit expands, the adoption of AI and automation technologies is on the rise, with workflow and process automation, generative AI, and machine learning emerging as the most sought-after solutions. However, there are significant
challenges associated with AI implementation, such as poor data quality and lack of interoperability between systems.
This year’s report underscores the vital role of information leaders in driving organizational success, the universal prioritization of information management, and the ongoing evolution of the technology stack. Seventy-two percent (72 percent) of respondents agreed that information management will become more important in the next twelve months. As businesses navigate the challenges and opportunities presented by unstructured data, investing in skilled professionals and robust information management practices will be essential for achieving strategic objectives and maintaining a competitive edge. Information management is
the management of unstructured data. This report is focused on the intelligent information management industry, which is a systematic approach to unstructured data management that integrates people, processes, information, and technology to achieve better business outcomes. Information management practitioners manage and leverage information throughout its lifecycle, from the point of creation to disposal.
Our survey results show that the importance of information management or unstructured data management will continue to be incredibly important within organizations. Seventytwo percent (72 percent) of respondents agreed that information management will become more important over the next 12 months (N=282).
The best way to understand the industry is by looking at the people who make the industry possible. Who is practicing information management? Who is taking responsibility for managing and, more importantly, leveraging the asset that is unstructured data within organizations? From this year’s data, it’s clear that the scope of responsibilities of information management practitioners is increasing as well as their level of responsibility within organizations. The practitioner is becoming increasingly hard to define and identify by traditional job titles, like Information Manager, Information Governance Manager, or Records Manager.
What’s also clear is that traditional information management professionals are no longer the only ones practicing information management and the responsibilities of information management are no longer allocated to specific, niche roles, organizations of a certain size, or specific industries.
Information management practices are evolving beyond a single profession as the practice of information management becomes a key responsibility for knowledge workers.
The data indicates a new breed of information management practitioner has emerged — the Information Leader. Information Leaders are practitioners who are
leading the management and use of unstructured data. More than just practitioners of information management, these individuals possess the skillset to understand, govern, and use invaluable unstructured data as well as the ability to effectively guide or lead change. They are not defined by job titles or traditional definitions of professions in information management, but rather by their skillsets and responsibilities within their organizations.
The respondents of this survey are largely practitioners in information management. However, as we will see in the next section, respondents are diverse and work in a variety of industries, departments, and organizations of all sizes.
A Crucial Skill
In the age of AI, information management has become a crucial skill for most knowledge workers. Information literacy and data literacy are essentially interchangeable concepts, as both involve the ability to collect, analyze, interpret, and manage data effectively.
The importance of these skills is increasingly recognized by business leaders, with 90 percent of them citing data literacy as a key factor in company success, according to Harvard Business Review.
As the volume of data increases and technology stacks expand, information management will become a critical responsibility for a growing number of knowledge workers. Ultimately, it is essential for everyone to develop information literacy and become Information Leaders.
AIIM Chairman 2023-2024
Karen Hobert summarized this evolution of the role when she said, “information management is not a role — it’s a need.”
Need for a Multifaceted Skill Set
Last year, AIIM interviewed an information and records management lead for a UK government agency. When discussing how AI is changing the role of information managers, who shared that modern information managers need new skillsets on top of old skillsets. They are still managing paper records, but now also automation, AI, intelligent
document processing, and more.
The lines are blurring between information management and information technology. Information management practitioners are being asked to provide technical application training and assist with AI initiatives in addition to information governance.
The role of an information management practitioner today requires a diverse range of skills and expertise across multiple domains. The data suggests that the most critical skills for this position include:
1. Information Lifecycle Management: A significant majority (73.24 percent) of professionals are very or extremely involved in this area, highlighting its importance in the field.
2. Information Governance: 66.85 percent of professionals are very or extremely involved in this practice, indicating its centrality to the role.
3. Data Management: Over half (57.39 percent) of the professionals are very or extremely involved in data
management, showcasing its significance.
4. Data Governance: 54.26 percent of professionals are very or extremely involved in this area, reflecting its growing importance in the industry.
5. Content Classification: 53.28 percent of professionals are very or extremely involved in this practice, suggesting its relevance to the role.
Other notable skills that are moderately to highly relevant include:
❯ Metadata/Taxonomy Development and Management
❯ Retention Schedule Development
❯ Physical Records Management and Storage Solutions
❯ Policy Development
❯ Change Management
❯ Business Process Management
❯ Information Architecture
❯ Security/Data Privacy
❯ Employee Information Management Training and Awareness
Skills such as Project Management, Business Analysis, Audit and
Compliance Monitoring and Reporting, and Information Security Strategy and administration are also relevant, with moderate involvement from professionals. Emerging areas like AI Governance are gaining traction, with 41.48 percent of professionals being moderately to extremely involved. Less emphasized skills include Software Development and Vendor Management, with lower levels of involvement.
Seniority and Influence Expand
As information management practitioner roles expand, it’s interesting to note their level of involvement in system selections for information management systems.
Information management practitioners are often involved in purchasing decisions for systems and applications in their organizations. The data shows that 64.9 percent of professionals have either shared involvement as part of an evaluation team or serve as the primary decision-maker. Over half (51.53 percent) are part of a collaborative evaluation team, while 10.58 percent have final approval authority. Only 11.14 percent reported no involvement, and 23.96 percent have light involvement without decisionmaking authority.
This highlights the significant role these practitioners play in influencing and shaping the selection of critical tools for effective information management within their companies.
What is your typical level of involvement in the decisionmaking process when purchasing information management systems or applications for your organizations?
Comparing the seniority of information management practitioners between 2023 and 2024 reveals a notable shift towards higher level positions. In 2023, 49 percent held mid-level executive roles, 39 percent were in non-managerial staff positions, and only 7 percent were senior executives. However, the 2024 data shows a significant increase in senior executives (14.88 percent) and mid-level executives (54.16 percent), while non-managerial positions decreased to 30.95
percent. This trend highlights the growing recognition of information management’s strategic importance and the elevation of its practitioners to roles with greater decision-making authority, underscoring the rising prominence of information management professionals within organizations.
Diversification of Departments
Today, information management practitioners work in a variety of departments, hold a range of different job titles, and operate at various levels of seniority. Indeed, without the title of “Information Manager” or “Record Manager”, it is becoming challenging to discern if someone is an information management professional.
Only 41 percent of respondents hold titles associated with traditional information management professionals, such as Records Manager, Information Governance Manager, and Information Manager. Titles such as IT Director (7 percent), Chief Data Officer (4 percent), Information Analyst (4 percent), and Project Manager (4 percent) were also popular. Notably, 19 percent of respondents said, “None of the above”.
The annual salary for information management practitioners is
management. Underscored by the expertise and skills of information management practitioners, these positions are increasingly senior, play a role in key strategic decisions and competitive advantage. Information management as a practice is becoming more prevalent, but the practitioner is becoming harder to define by any singular job title or job skill analysis. We are finding that information management as a practice is becoming a part of diverse roles across the organization alongside information management professionals taking on more and more diverse responsibilities within their organizations. Contemporary information management professionals have capabilities that frequently blur the lines of technology, information, literacy, ethics, crisis management and leadership.
reflective of the breadth of skills, decision-making authority, and seniority required for information leaders. Fifty-one (51 percent) of respondents earn above $100,000 annually. The compensation range for information management practitioners is higher than the average salary of knowledge workers in the United States, which are generally in the range of $70,00090,000 per year. With an above average annual salary, information management is a lucrative profession that attracts wages that reflect the specific, advanced skillset required to effectively manage unstructured data.
While a career in information management is worthwhile, there is still a problem with the aging population. The median age of information management practitioners continues to rise. Seventy-six (76 percent) of respondents are over the age of 45.
Conclusion
As organizations navigate the AI era, data and information is a vital part of enterprise success. This year’s report shows the increasing prioritization of high quality and accessible data and information, which is only possible through the practice of information management. More organizations are investing in information
While the growth of information management and expansion of responsibilities makes it challenging to define the professional of today, this trends also presents opportunities. It has created opportunities for increased influence, collaboration and interdisciplinary work. When information managers are embedded in other teams or working on crossdepartmental projects, they can curate a more successful information management program by leveraging their deeper understanding of line of business needs, ethical data and information practices and desired business outcomes. It has also made the profession more accessible by introducing the practice of information management to professionals in other fields. This diversity of perspectives can spark innovation and new processes for managing information alongside an appreciation of the deep and complex responsibility for information trust, transparency and stewardship.
ANNE CORNISH is the CEO of RIMPA Global. RIMPA is a leading organisation that represents Records and Information Management Practitioners worldwide.
Information Management: A Universal Priority
BY TORI MILLER LIU
At AIIM, we have spent the past year identifying and talking about orthodox beliefs, or negative assumptions we hold about the world around us. This year’s report calls into question an orthodox belief held by the information management industry: that information management systems and programs are only accessible to large organizations with substantial resources.
The reality is that information management systems and technologies have become more affordable and accessible to organizations of all sizes, across industries. We have moved past the days of monolithic electronic content management (ECM) systems operated by a select few and instead find customized, diverse technology stacks and information management programs that are tailored to each specific organization. Organizations are either riding or trying to catch the AI wave. Success with AI is dependent on the ecosystem of people, processes, and data within an organization. AI adoption cannot happen in isolation. If your organization lacks the ability to manage and leverage unstructured data to use for AI and manage the output of AI, you are missing the foundation of your AI program.
As you read this research, I encourage you to evaluate your own information management program. How does your program compare to the average organization? Do you have the appropriate number of staff to adequately manage the increasing volume of data within your organization? Does your staff have sufficient skills and knowledge to manage and leverage unstructured data to advance your strategic goals? Do you have Information Leaders within your organization who can guide AI and automation strategies and lead your information management programs.
The role and responsibilities of the practitioner are defined by how their organization perceives the value of information and information management as a practice. In this year’s survey, respondents were asked about their
information management programs to assess the level of investment organizations are making into unstructured data management. The results show that investment in information management is surging across industries and organizations of all sizes.
Adoption Surges Across Industries
Information management is expanding beyond large organizations in regulated industries. The results from this year’s survey demonstrate this increasing diversity. The value of information management goes beyond compliance and regulation. Harnessing unstructured data leads to better decision making, better customer experiences, and better business outcomes. Information management practitioners still tend to work in highly regulated industries, though. Unsurprisingly, more heavily regulated industries have the largest concentration of individuals who work either directly or indirectly in information management. Government and Public Services emerges as the largest segment at 25 percent, Banking and Finance represents 8 percent, Education represents 7 percent each. Energy, Oil & Gas, and Mining collectively account for 5 percent, as do Charity and Non-Profit organizations, while Healthcare represents 4 percent of respondents. Yet, demonstrates the breadth of cross-industry adoption of information management practices.
What’s notable in this year’s report is the increase in respondents from small and midsize organizations. As the cost of information management systems continues to decrease and the importance of unstructured data management to achieving strategic goals increases, it’s clear that organizations of all sizes see the benefit in retaining information management practitioners.
Organizations Invest
As a sign of increasing economic pressures and rising costs, the reasons behind investing in and prioritizing information management have shifted since
2023. In 2023, AIIM found that the top three organizational goals related to information management were compliance (30 percent); customer service (16 percent); and costs and productivity (11 percent). In this years’ survey, respondents were asked more directly to provide input on the top three reasons their organization invests in information management.
The top three most popular reasons for investing in information management in 2024 included Compliance & Risk (70 percent); Digital Transformation (38 percent); and Costs and Productivity (37 percent). All three areas, even Digital Transformation, are about reducing risks and costs. This increased emphasis could be due to a larger percentage of information management practitioners responding to this year’s survey, but also could reflect the economic slowdown of the past year and a desire amongst organizations to avoid costly violations.
Interestingly, Customer Service moved down to the fifth most prevalent reason behind investment at 25 percent. Information Leaders can use these reasons or drivers to gain buy-in and budgetary support for new projects and information management programs within their organizations.
Reasons for investing change based on perspectives. AIIM has spoken with many solution providers and system integrators in the past year who report that sales are not being made by focusing on compliance and risk, but instead focusing on business outcomes. Consultants and Suppliers of Information Management Software or Services were excluded from survey results, but their response to this question was interesting because they put less weight on compliance & Risk (52 percent) while it was still the top cited reason for investment.
Thirty-eight percent (38 percent) of solution providers who responded to the survey also selected Competitive advantage and 35 percent selected Costs & Productivity as primary reasons for investing in information management.
A Shortage of Skillsets in AI
In addition to a talent shortage, organizations may also be facing a gap in required skillsets. Respondents were asked to rate the internal information management skillsets in their organization. The weakest areas where respondents tended to feel that their organization mainly had no proficiency or beginner level proficiency were in artificial governance; process and workflow design; and records management.
What is concerning about this lack of proficiency is most organization are planning investments and implementation in generative AI; Workflow and process automation solutions; and Records Management Solutions in the next 1-3 years. Training can be accomplished during software implementation, but generally it’s a best practice to have internal skillsets to provide ongoing, operational support for a technology platform before making a significant investment. This helps ensure the sustainability of the product within an organization. Skill gaps impact effectiveness across different information management initiatives withing organizations. The areas where organizations are least effective are generative AI use and governance, knowledge management, extracting data and intelligence from information, long-term information preservation, and workflow and process automation. Most employees lack advanced skills in using and governing generative AI, according to a survey. Only 31 percent of respondents felt their organization had more than beginner level proficiency in these areas. Knowledge management also shows a significant lack of proficiency, with 10.76 percent of organizations having no proficiency and 32.27 percent at the beginner level. The other mentioned areas have around 10-13 percent of organizations with no proficiency and a significant portion at the beginner level.
TORI MILLER LIU, CIP, is President & CEO of the Association for Intelligent Information Management.
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