Before we move into 2015 for good, let's look back at 2014 and trends that we had imagined in January for this year.
1. Won - Industry: The fall of some major players, and the emergence of new ones
If Litmus did not carry out a major acquisition as I had mentioned it, one can say that there was movement at the level of the economic actors of the email. In France (and internationally too), some historical actors of the market have a lot of trouble to keep their head above water. We can also see that the IT giants continue to invest in email and eCRM. The most important acquisition this year was the acquisition of Silverpop by IBM. Email marketing/eCRM solutions aimed at large accounts but not backed by a software giant are becoming increasingly rare.
On the front of startups dedicated to emailing, many of them have grown significantly in 2014, often by tackling related niches, such as Tinyclues for predictive segmentation/perso, many solutions for transactional email or responsive email editors like EDMdesigner.
2. Won - The growing impossibility to deliver an email if it is not opt-in (or double opt-in)
If there is a trend that is confirmed, it is this one! How many advertisers (but also and especially players in email acquisition) have not tried to change their router this year in order to overcome their deliverability problems when it is clearly their recruitment practices that are to blame and not the quality of the platforms they use.
The big webmails, especially American ones, do an exceptional job in terms of filtering from a consumer point of view. They are now very good at guessing whether an advertiser respects good practices in terms of consent (even though there is always room for improvement). And B2B is not immune.
3. Lost - New changes in the inbox and the emergence of micro-formats in the emailing world
There was some change in 2014, but it was mainly from Gmail that it again came to shake up its interface. And as for micro-formatsHowever, it cannot be said that this has spread at an incredible speed to other webmails. This may be due to the fact that eCRM platforms do not yet allow for the simple integration of this type of data into emails.
4. Mitigated - Professionalization and outsourcing of emailing production
We can't say that we saw the emergence of many agencies dedicated to emailing and eCRM in 2014. For all that, we see another phenomenon arriving, that is the shortage of production resources for everything related to emailing and the eCRM platform. How many ads, job offers for html integration specialists for email, Neolane project managers, ... have not found candidates? A lot, even in large groups that should attract the crowds thanks to their prestigious names.
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Full service (and hybrid mode) is clearly an area where Badsender plans to put a lot of effort in 2015.
5. Lost - Focus on quality recruitment programs
No, really, we are not there at all! However, as we have seen above, it is becoming essential or else you will be slapped in the face. Unfortunately, it seems that there are still many, many, manys education on the subject of deliverability.
6. Won - The banalization of responsive emailing
No, not all the emails you received this year are responsive yet. However, things have progressed well this year. The techniques are better and better mastered, it's an almost automatic passage when an advertiser redesigns its templates, ... Badsender has accompanied several advertisers in the redesign of templates in 2014, and quite a few projects are coming for 2015.
7. Won - Email-to-store: The end of the border between the digital and physical world
We can't say that the work is definitely done, but 2014 saw a huge shift in this field. Many retailers have started using email as an integral part of their strategy. This includes generating in-store traffic from digital channels (in which email has a prominent place along with mobile), but also as an extension of the physical experience, via the sending of dematerialized receipts, cross-sell/up-sell, ... on this field 2015 should still bring us some major evolutions.
And in a few days, we will see what the trends for 2015 should be.
