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50 November 2015 | beautystorebusiness.com MOBILE DEVICES RULE Not surprisingly, much of that mobile email is being read on Apple devices. A full 33% of all mobile email is opened either on an iPhone or iPad, accord- ing to Knotice. "People are on the go all the time," says Kim Snyder, CEO of Overall Beauty. "Why check your email only to find that it looks terrible? You can lose business that you never knew you [might have] gotten from a badly designed email. Even Google rolled out new updates that if your website didn't look good on mobile devices you would get "docked" and no matter how much you are paying for advertising, Google can or will drop you to the end of the page one of search results, or more." All told, 64% of Americans now own a smartphone and for many of those people, a mobile device is their only connection to the online world, accord- ing to a Pew Research Center report released last spring. Mobile users are most likely to read email on their devices at the start of the workday or right after dinner, Knotice says—although the researchers found that there has been an overall increase in email opens on mobile devices throughout the day. Researchers at Knotice also debunked an oft-repeated myth: Overwhelmingly, mobile users do not use their smart- phones and tablets to "preview" emails that they later read on their desktops or laptops. Instead those emails only get one chance to make a good impression: Only 2% of emails opened on a mobile are re-read on more traditional devices later, Knotice found. CALLS TO ACTION Interestingly, mobile users are still hesitant, Knotice found, to engage in "calls-to-action" on their mobile devices: invitations to click on links, buy products, send a reply email, make a call, or similar interactivity. A major- ity of users still prefer to make those clicks on their laptops and desktops, according to Knotice. "We can still attribute this to the fact that many email marketers have yet to successfully optimize email content to mobile users," Knotice's researchers say. Snyder agrees. "With more people checking their emails on their phones and ordering using their phones, if you've got a call to action link within the email so that they can click and it goes to your mobile-optimized website—they tend to buy off those websites—sites that look as good on the phone as they do on a computer." Moreover, many mobile users are still hesitant to engage in commercial activity on mobile devices, which may require revealing credit card info, banking info or other critical, personal identifiers. Com- pared to desktops and laptops, which are often guarded by firewalls and Internet security software, mobile devices often have much less protection from hackers. EMAIL STRATEGIES One takeaway is certain from both studies: Marketers for beauty stores who take pains to ensure their emails are easily readable and easily manipulable on mobile devices stand to reap substantially greater profits. A study released by Yesmail earlier this year—Yesmail's Email Marketing Compass—found that 40% of all clicks on links in emails were triggered on mobile devices in the fourth quarter of 2014. Yesmail researchers also found that more marketers are taking greater pains to ensure their emails look good on mobile devices. Essentially, 37% of all emails sent in the fourth quarter of last year were optimized for mobile devices—a 23% increase over emails sent in the prior quarter. Many "marketers seem to have rec- ognized that responsive design doesn't just make email more accessible for mobile readers—it also significantly affects the bottom line," Yesmail's researchers wrote. Even so, many more businesses sell- ing via email need to do the same, according to Michael Fisher, president, Yes Lifecycle Marketing. "Considering the importance that marketers place on listening to their customers and catering to their preferences, it's surprising that brands have been slow to optimize the mobile experience." BEST PRACTICES Here are some recommended best prac- tices drawn from BlueHornet's study. • Design for mobile: There are scores of mobile email design tips you can find on the Web with the key-phrase "mobile email design best practices." Generally speaking, it's a good idea to use images in your marketing emails that can scale according to screen size. You'll also want to feature crisp, terse copy and large fonts. Feature large buttons, which people can tap to interact with your email. • Offer discounts: If possible, offer a discount as a way for a mobile user— or any user, for that matter—to sign up for your email marketing list. Blue- Hornet found that 84% of respondents signed up for an email marketing list when they were lured with the promise of discounts. • Implement "text-to-join": Make it easier for mobile users to sign up for your email list by including a text-to-join option in the emails you send to them. • Ask permission: Many beauty stores are under the impression it's perfectly okay to add a customer to their email list as long as they've sold a good or service to that person. Consum- ers don't agree. A full 75% surveyed said that simply doing business with America's voracious appetite for devices like HTC's Windows-compatible phone is changing how beauty stores are designing emails. A full 33% of all mobile email is opened either on an iPhone or iPad, according to Knotice. Image courtesy of Joe Dysart