As a marketing executive, I will not dismiss the effort marketers are putting into improving marketing automation utilizing targeted email, however, recent research shows that people are opening emails at increasingly significant rates. In just over the last 12-15 months, people are opening marketing emails 35% more. In 1Q2011 the open rate was 23.3% rising to 31.1% in 1Q2013. This is a significant change over a very short period of time. The dominant factor appears to be the adoption of smartphones and tablets.

Today, according to BlueHornet, an email service provider, 71.8% of U.S. email users ages 24 to 40 examine their email throughout the day. Marketing software provider Knotice notes that 41.1% of U.S. emails read in the second half of 2012 were done so using either a mobile phone or tablet. Other estimates put the rate in 2013 at 60% with an ultimate target of 80% of emails to be read by a mobile device.

Additional information is in the article as posted by eMarketer that is very useful to those of you that sell to consumers. I suggest that you reserve time to read it as it is only about 3 pages long but with very valuable information and insights. As for the B2B readers of this blog, please note that using emails to target potential customers and key decision makers remains inexpensive and effective. ANPI uses email marketing for a number of campaigns supporting marketing and sales. For more, read an earlier blog “Effective Email Marketing”.

Switching to broadband… I have written several blogs discussing Access, Speed and Price (ASP) of broadband in the U.S. While the FCC and domestic carriers tend to compare ASP against each other, I prefer to look at how the U.S. stacks up against other countries. Having a leading ASP offering or infrastructure provides a competitive advantage to the businesses within the country. Regrettably, the U.S. position on broadband is not improving when compared to countries around the world. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) ranks the U.S. 23rd in a measure of price per second of downloaded content. The well-known Internet metrics company, Ookla, ranks the U.S. at 28th for download speeds.

So, while Asia and Europe expand investment into fiber and faster broadband speeds, the U.S. not only lags, but is dropping in comparison. To add to this disappointment, the U.S. subscription prices have increased as our position falls. OECD indicates that Comcast prices rose 60% from 2008 to 2012 while bitrates went unchanged.

Determining why the U.S. broadband infrastructure is not improving is difficult as multiple reasons are given. Among these are a lack of competition, too much competition, cost of new infrastructure and monopolistic practices. There may be a bit of truth to all but the problem will not be solved until the given greater priority.

The FCC acknowledges broadband as the infrastructure challenge of the early 21st century. However, government cannot solve this problem but it can assist through grants and policies that promote investment in upgrading existing infrastructure to support globally competitive ASP. The problem must be addressed by carriers, cable companies and those that invest in network infrastructure.

 I’ll keep doing my part by providing regular visibility to the problem and identifying those working to resolve it.