Does Email's Strong Performance Hurt Overall Spending?

Well, that is what JupiterResearch's "US E-mail Marketing Forecast, 2007 to 2012" report says. I tend to agree. Most executives and marketers think email should rarely get a big chunk of the budget pie despite carrying more than its weight. Is that fair? No, but that is business and I do believe it is changing for the better.

Email marketing spending will grow to $2.1 billion in 2012 from $1.2 billion in 2007. Retention email, which is what BrightWave Marketing specializes in, would more than double through 2012 and account for more than half of total email marketing spending.
Acquisition email marketing was pegged to grow more slowly, with sponsorships such as ad-supported newsletters accounting for most spending.

Comments from the analysts reflect the current state of email marketing...

“E-mail service providers have done a solid job of standardizing feedback loops with Internet service providers and are continuing to make needed improvements in e-mail delivery,” said David Daniels, vice president and research director at JupiterResearch.

"E-mail marketing is effective, but spending is tempered by the somewhat but not entirely valid impression among many companies that e-mail is inexpensive marketing and that they therefore need not throw too much money at those programs," said David Hallerman, senior analyst at eMarketer.

With more attention to email's slighted share in the budget game and the public market debut of ExactTarget (following ConstantContact's 2007 IPO), email will gain more mainstream attention in the media and C suites in 2008. You can count on that.