Recent stats show mobile devices continue to dominate desktops, delivering 61% of e-mail opens in the latest quarter while desktops were only used to open emails 39% of the time.
Tablets are still in the minority, accounting only for 15% of email opens. This is a bit surprising, as the tablet is a much more forgiving screen and interface for email browsing. The figure most likely reflects the still-limited penetration of tablets in the US market.
The quarterly consumer device report was spearheaded by
Movable Ink, and used data from their proprietary email marketing software used by over 100 enterprise-level clients.
Here's a visual breakdown of the preferred devices for email opens:
On its own, this figure should be a wake-up call to any email marketers without a mobile strategy. Emails must be both optimized for the smaller screen of the smartphone while also living up to the increased real-estate demands of both the tablet and desktop experiences.
More results quoted from the survey:
- Over 15% of emails were opened on a tablet, up from a little under 14% in Q2 2013.
- iPad use grew 10% over the last quarter, and now accounts for 14.3% of total email opens.
- Android tablets now comprise only .9% of total email opens, this number has grown nearly 27% from the prior quarter (up from .7% of total email opens in Q2 2013).
- The iPhone/iOS continue to reign as the most popular smartphone used for checking email, accounting for 78.7% of all smartphone email opens.
- Android phones accounted for 20.7% of smartphone opens and 9.4% of total email opens this quarter.
- Android users spend the most time viewing emails. Consistent with Q2 findings, 53% spend 15 seconds or more viewing each message, compared to 41% of iPhone users.
- Desktops lead in the West, while the East trends towards smartphone use.
- Texas is the most smartphone friendly state, with over 53% of emails opened on a smartphone.
- On the whole, the majority of the East and South prefer using smartphones for email. In the Central and Western parts of the country, most emails are opened on smartphones.
Given this geographical breakdown, email marketers should also consider how these geographies and device preferences play into an email marketing strategy.
Some very targeted messages could be sent using this information, which might encourage conversions due to the more complete understanding of how the message is consumed.
The full report can be viewed here.
NB: Email image courtesy Shutterstock.