The Total Economic Impact™ Of Attentive Email

Profit From Improved Triggered Email Creation With Improved Subscriber Identification And List Growth

Evidence and data. The interviewees unanimously shared that revenue from triggered emails increased at their organizations since migrating to Attentive. They said this was critical because triggered emails comprise the majority of their organizations’ total email revenues. Interviewees also shared that their organizations improved their ability to understand subscribers’ behaviors and that interactions with their websites improved identification due to the Attentive custom tag being refreshed more often due to more traffic driven to brand websites from SMS. This ultimately increased the number of emails that are appropriately triggered to a subscriber’s inbox.

• The head of e-commerce at an apparel and fashion retailer shared: “Flows are where we saw our biggest win. … Better technology, better data match, and being able to recognize and tie it to a customer. … Our flow volume doubled which resulted in our revenue doubling.”
• The head of growth at a consumer goods organization shared, “It has been very clear that we’re making more from our regular flows.” They estimated their organization sees an extra $60,000 in automated revenue per month, which is double the revenue prior to using Attentive.”
• The senior DTC manager at a health retailer commented: “The quality of [Attentive’s] tracking pixel is above and beyond [that of] anyone else in the space. We’d seen how great and useful it was in SMS and building audiences, so to be able to do that as easily and visually for email was not something we could pass up.”
• Interviewees’ organizations saw average unique triggered open rates between 48% and 52%, triggered click through rates between 4% and 10%, and triggered conversion rates between 17% and 24%.

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• The composite has 1.5 million email subscribers with its legacy ESP, and that number grows 5% year over year.
• With Attentive, the composite adds 300,000 net-new email subscribers in Year 1, 675,000 in Year 2, and 1,158,750 in Year 3.
• Before using Attentive, the composite’s average number of automated emails triggered per journey per subscriber was 1.25.
• With Attentive, the number of automated emails triggered appropriately increases by 100%.
• The average number of automated journeys triggered by each subscriber is 1.75 in Year 1 and 2.5 in Years 2 and 3.
• The triggered email unique open rate is 40% in Year 1 and 45% in Years 2 and 3.
• The triggered email click through rate is 4% in Year 1, 5% in Year 2, and 6% in Year 3.
• The triggered email conversion rate is 20%.
• The composite’s average order value is $100 and its operating margin is 10%.

Risks. The impact of this benefit can vary among organizations based on:

• The organization’s preexisting email marketing program and subscriber base as it relates to the potential uplift with Attentive Email.

• The level of engagement of the organization’s subscriber base as it relates to the number of automated journey and open, click and conversion rates on email messages.
• The organization’s industry as it relates to average order value and profit margin.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 15%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $831,000.

Campaign Email Profits From Subscriber List Growth

Evidence and data. While interviewees shared that campaign email contributes a smaller portion of revenue to their organizations’ overall email programs compared to triggered email, they told Forrester their companies realized campaign revenue gains through subscriber list growth. Interviewees noted the impact of increasing campaign send volume by configuring and optimizing pop-ups on their websites.

• The head of e-commerce at the apparel and fashion retailer told Forrester: “From our testing, we’ve been able to see 20% to 30% increases [in lead capture and opt-in rates], which was stronger than where it was with [our prior ESP].”
• The owner, agency at the consumer goods organization shared: “I would say the Attentive pop-up and email and SMS capture is [among] the best I’ve seen across ESPs. … I would say around 17% [of our list growth is associated with pop-ups].”

• The retention marketing manager at the e-commerce organization said: “Our list size is growing, and our revenue percent is growing. It’s a pretty substantial lift that we’ve seen since switching to Attentive. … Each month, I send between 12 and 16 main campaigns that are close to full-list sends, and then there are more campaigns that are high-intent or preview subscribers.”
• The retention and CRM specialist at the health retailer reported sending two campaign emails a week to their company’s subscriber list.
• Interviewees said their organizations saw unique campaign open rates between 42% and 47% and campaign conversion rates between 0.93% and 8.2%.

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• The composite has 1.5 million email subscribers with its legacy ESP, and this number grows 5% year over year.
• With Attentive, the composite’s subscriber list size grows 20% in Year 1 and by 25% in Years 2 and 3.
• Each subscriber receives 156 campaign emails annually.
• The campaign email unique open rate is 35% in Year 1 and 40% in Years 2 and 3.
• The campaign email click-through rate 0.5% in Year 1, 1% in Year 2, and 1.25% in Year 3.
• The campaign email conversion rate is 2% in Year 1, 5% in Year 2, and 8% in Year 3.
• The average order value is $100, and the operating margin is 10%.

Risks. The impact of this benefit can vary among organizations based on:

• The organization’s preexisting email marketing program and its subscriber base as it relates to the potential uplift with Attentive Email.
• The level of engagement of the organization’s subscriber base as it relates to open rates, click rates, and conversion rates on email messages.
• The number of campaign emails sent per subscriber.
• The organization’s industry as it relates to average order value and profit margin.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 15%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $622,000.

Email Marketing Manager Efficiencies

Evidence and data. Interviewees said the Attentive Email platform is easy to use and that its navigation, integrations, and automation features saved their organizations time in daily tasks including subscriber list cleanup, pulling reports, and scheduling campaigns. The interviewees commented that because of the ease of use, their organizations were encouraged to explore and take advantage of all the tools and resources the platform had to offer instead of leaving features and advanced functionality unexplored.

• The owner, agency at a consumer goods organization estimated her team saved 12 hours per month on list cleaning. They said: “Attentive introduced known litigators in their software … that automatically opt people out who are like spam bots. A lot of ESPs end up letting bots or other people sit in the program because it helps with list growth. One of the differences operationally of the Attentive program that we’ve grown to really love as a team is that it is auto-cleaning. Cleaning became this AI-generated effort. It’s not a manual effort anymore where you have to go through and week over week or day by day and remove that kind of stuff.”
• The retention marketing manager in e-commerce estimated their organization saved 15% to 20% on scheduling campaigns with Attentive. They elaborated, “If I have the design, I can get a whole campaign schedule in 5 minutes or less.”
• The senior DTC manager at a health retailer commented: “We spent a lot of manual time exporting and importing audiences in [our prior ESP]. [With Attentive’s integrations,] there were time savings. … At least 3 hours a month were spent just building audiences manually.”
• The same interviewee said, “Our retention and CRM specialist has saved at least 10 hours a month just pulling reporting.”
• The head of e-commerce at an apparel and fashion retailer explained: “From a technical perspective, things are a bit easier. The way that you can tie coupons/discounts into Attentive has been smoother. … [The speed to go live] is marginally faster. The builder is a little bit simpler.”

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• One email marketing manager is responsible for campaign creation, list cleanup, integrations, and reporting.
• With Attentive, the email marketing manager saves 35% of their time annually on these tasks.
• The fully burdened annual salary of the email marketing manager is $114,750.

Risks. The impact of this benefit can vary among organizations based on:

• Employees’ salaries.
• The scale of the organization’s preexisting email marketing program.
• The skill and capacity of the organization’s marketing resources.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 10%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $90,000.

Unquantified Benefits

Interviewees mentioned the following additional benefits that their organizations experienced but were not able to quantify:

• Collaborative customer support. Attentive’s customer support team is quick to troubleshoot and remove barriers, whether technical or operational, that impede email marketing performance. Aside from issue resolution, Attentive’s support teams are willing and available to share industry best practices and brainstorm strategy to support further innovation in email communication.
  • The retention marketing manager at an e-commerce organization shared, “Attentive has more of an interest in helping you build further instead of just keeping the ship afloat.”
  • The head of e-commerce at an apparel and fashion retailer told Forrester: “I’ve been in marketing for 10-plus years, and I think there are only two vendors that I can actually say, ‘[They have] 10 out of 10 customer service. I highly recommend [them].’ One of them is Attentive.”
• Ease of migration. Interviewees said Attentive’s methodical, step-by-step migration process allows marketers to analyze the impact of switching platforms while maintaining uninterrupted messaging to all audiences. The senior DTC manager at a health retailer elaborated: “Attentive took the approach of first migrating journeys. It felt seamless. Our IP warming was operating in the background. I think [Attentive] figured out pacing in a way that makes really low impact for the brand.”
  
  The retention marketing manager at the e-commerce organization commented, “[The process] felt less like a risk and more of an opportunity.”
• Email and SMS orchestration. With access to a combined platform for email and SMS, interviewees said marketers can access a unified dashboard of analytics that aids in dual-channel messaging. They explained that this allows marketers to focus on how targeting and messaging resonates with subscribers rather than ensuring efforts are coordinated across two different platforms. It also allows marketers to learn about subscriber engagement through a single view, rather than comparing across platforms with varying technical capabilities.
  • The senior DTC manager at a health retail organization shared, “Having email and SMS together really pushed us to towards far more maturity than what we had previously.”
  • The head of e-commerce at an apparel and fashion retailer said: “[The orchestration] is cohesive, but at times independent. … We can send an email, and if they don’t respond, [we can] then send an SMS. We can orchestrate the campaigns and how those overlap between the two programs.”
• Opt-out rate improvements. Forrester Research states: “Helping customers stay masters of their email relationships with you can keep them loyal. Preference centers offer a ‘central command’ where end users can indicate their content and frequency preferences.”²  Interviewees said Attentive affords customers an easy way to manage their email preferences, including the ability to opt out of messages and that this allows marketing teams to learn about customer preferences and gain the knowledge to communicate with their audiences more strategically.
  
  One interviewee shared a specific use case that illustrates how this drives a decrease in opt-out rate. For the purposes of this study, an example model benefit is included for reference in Appendix D. This is not included in the financial model for the composite organization.
  
  The senior DTC manager at a health retail organization estimated a 12% decrease in their organization’s opt-out rate. They commented, “I think the ability for people to opt out so easily and manage their preferences makes it a much better experience for customers.”

Flexibility

The value of flexibility is unique to each customer. There are multiple scenarios in which a customer might implement Attentive Email and later realize additional uses and business opportunities, including:

• Exploring new integrations. Recognizing the initial impact that integrations afford their marketing teams, interviewees shared anticipation for future integrations as a means to drive additional revenue. The senior DTC manager at a health retail organization told Forrester: “I know there will be more integrations in the future. Based on one of the vendors Attentive connected us with, we just hit $1 million in incremental revenue for the year so far. It’s just awesome. … I wouldn’t have pursued either of these two vendor partners on my own. They just weren’t really on my radar.”
• Driving further efficiencies with AI. Forrester research states, “How companies handle outbound communications today is and will continue to serve as a foundation for delivering these future experiences. Marketing automation solutions can use artificial intelligence (AI) to choose the right person, content, channel, and time to push out content and services.”³
  
  As generative AI continues to mature, the interviewees look to this technology to influence messaging, including subject line and content image generation, and drive subscriber behavior and engagement forecasting. Interviewees specifically mentioned Attentive’s Magic Composer feature.
  
  The owner, agency at a consumer goods organization shared: “You’re going to be able to optimize analytics and reporting. … I think especially with AI, some of the solutions that [Attentive is] coming out with are going to help you be able to target lists. … We think that predictive purchasing will be huge. You can look at your monthly calendar and increase the revenue of your email program by simply running reports in Attentive and seeing who we should contact and what should we do there instead of trying to spin your wheels as a marketing team to figure out campaign ideas.”
  
  The retention marketing manager at the e-commerce organization told Forrester: “I’m a copywriter at heart, but it is nice when you’re trying to make the same deal sound new. You don’t have to go to [a third-party chat generator]. It’s just right there [in the Attentive platform]. There are so many things that I don’t even think I fully appreciate because they’re just now kind of part of my daily routine.”
• Defining additional triggered automations. Interviewees said that as teams continue to segment audiences according to subscriber behavior and engagement levels, there’s excitement in defining new triggered journeys. The retention marketing manager at the e-commerce organization shared an example: “We’re working on a sunset flow. Our list has grown so much, but that does mean we have a lot of unengaged subscribers. We’re looking to identify those people in the most successful way without alienating potential revenue.”

Flexibility would also be quantified when evaluated as part of a specific project (described in more detail in Appendix A).