Twilio SendGrid has released its 2022 Global Messaging Engagement Report, which highlights customer frustration with the messages they receive from brands as a significant CX trend.
In fact, most of the 4,800 consumer participants believe that receiving too many messages from a brand is frustrating and annoying, with 52% of global respondents reporting that they would unsubscribe if a company emailed them every day.
Yet, frequency is not the only source of frustration that often comes with customer emails. 24% of global respondents pinpointed irrelevant content as a top turnoff.
The pattern of companies getting frequency and relevancy wrong is not unique to email. Twilio found these to be the biggest gripes with SMS customer communication too.
However, frequent emails are not necessarily a customer experience killer. According to recipient interviews within the report, most are not against receiving emails, as long as they provide value. Often, it is the repetitive messaging that annoys them and fosters unsubscribes.
Of course, if companies harness personalisation tools to enhance customer communication, they could instead customize messaging to relieve frustration and drive better engagement rates.
So, instead of recommending the same sale three times in a week – for example – Twilio recommend a different approach.
As the report states: "If those same three emails contained product recommendations customized to their past buying behaviour, a deal on one of their most frequently bought items, and a timely company update, recipients said they would be more likely to overlook the message frequency and engage with these messages."
Customers are also becoming more familiar with such personalisation and are increasingly comfortable with its role within CX. Only 30% of respondents reported not wanting to share more personal info with businesses.