Speed and Relevance Key to E-Newsletters

The report is based on three rounds of studies of a total of 93 Web users, most from the United States. Its findings offer advice for both for-profit and nonprofit e-newsletter senders.

For example, the study found the e-newsletter subscribe process to be an average of four minutes, and cited a direct correlation between the time it takes to subscribe to an e-newsletter and the users’ overall satisfaction with the newsletter. The report recommends e-newsletter senders aim for new subscriptions to take less than a minute when the subscription requires just the user’s e-mail address. If more information is needed to subscribe, the report advises that the process should take no more than two minutes.