Email marketers are excited about recent industry news from research company Smith-Harmon: Retail email volume increased 12 percent from 2008 to 2009, with an amazing 37 percent two-year increase from 2007 to 2009. However, while this increase is substantial, experts are predicting a break-even or decrease in the coming years.

"Retailers have been increasing contact frequency for several years running," says Ed Henrich, Vice President at Responsys. "Sooner or later it will flatten out. I think 2010 is when we will finally start to see segmentation and analytics start to reduce contact frequency."

An interesting trend in the Smith-Harmon report is the dramatic volume increase of Saturday emails in November and December. Retailers' habits indicate they used the weekend window to get special offers out during the winter holidays. While the current trend is that most emails get sent out on Fridays, the most popular day of the week to send does not mean the best day to send your email. Continually monitor your data to understand your audiences' open/click rates and determine what works best for them.

While the entire picture here is painted quite positively with this increase, it also indicates that it is more important than ever to keep your email communications targeted to an audience truly interested in your products/services, and relevant to their needs. With the increase in email volume, readers will be more apt to hit the delete button if they do not recognize your email or are not interested in your offer.

Another strong consideration is the number of emails you distribute. Bombarding your audience with emails will hurt you more than you think. According to the CMO Council, 22 percent of email recipients said they made their decision to stop doing business with a company because they received too many emails from them, and an additional 41 percent would consider stopping purchases from companies sending too many emails.

Bottom line: if you don't have an important message or offer, don't send it.

Source: eMarketer.com

John Leary is a Senior Art Director at Long Island advertising agency Austin & Williams, who possesses both a remarkable gift for graphic design as well as a deep understanding of today’s emerging technological advances. To read more about John, visit his bio section on the A&W web site.