Consumers are the ultimate judges of how well the email marketing industry is performing. That’s why the annual DMA / fast.MAP Email Tracking Study provides such valuable insight for marketers: it tells us what consumers really think of the marketing emails they receive, the content they prefer, what captures their attention and what turns them off.

This year, the study will make particularly welcome reading for email marketers. The results reveal that consumer approval ratings of email marketing have surged over the past 12 months. The number of consumers reporting that 50% or more of the marketing emails they receive are of interest to them has increased over the past year from one in 10 (9%) in 2010, to one in three (30%) in 2011. Just one in four (24%) of consumers now say that only less than 10% of the marketing emails they receive are of relevance to them – down from two-thirds (64%) of consumers in 2010.