By Melissa Campanelli
April 24, 2008
Nearly one out of every five permission-based e-mail messages sent to U.S.-based Internet service providers lands in the junk mail folder.
This is a key finding from the Lyris HQ ISP Deliverability Report Card for Q4 2007, a research study that monitors deliverability rates for permission-based e-mail marketing messages.
However, according to the study -- sponsored by e-marketing technology firm Lyris -- slightly more than 76 percent of invited e-mail successfully makes it to the inbox.
For the study, Lyris HQ EmailAdvisor monitored the delivery of more than 430,000 permission-based e-mail marketing messages sent between Oct. 1, 2007 and Dec. 31, 2007. The messages were sent from 69 different businesses and nonprofit organizations to multiple accounts at 59 ISP domains in the U.S., Canada, Europe and Australia.
In the U.S., the ISP with the highest inbox delivery rate is AIM.com, with 93 percent of its delivered messages landing in the inbox. Road Runner SoCal is a close second at 92 percent, while the rest of the top 10 have inbox delivery rates in the 80s. Hotmail is second from the bottom, with just 57 percent of its delivered messages reaching the inbox.
The U.S. ISPs most likely to put invited e-mail to the junk mail folder include XO Concentric (62 percent of its total delivered permission-based messages were sent to the junk mail folder) and SBC Global (23 percent of its messages). MSN, Hotmail and Yahoo! all hover around 21 percent. AOL is closer to the other end -- with just 1.2 percent of its delivered e-mail landing in the junk mail folder.
Outside the U.S., European ISPs had the highest percentage of junk mail delivery at 19 percent -- compared with 14 percent for Canada and 10 percent for Australia.
To view the full report, click here.
