Key takeaways ✨
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Email marketing continues to be unmatched when it comes to the return on investment (ROI) it drives. In fact, 35% of companies see a whopping $10-$36 for every $1 spent.
Is there anything you can do to drive an even higher return? Absolutely. And we compiled and analyzed that data from nearly 500 marketing professionals to give you the insights into those actions. Check out the highlights below.
Table of contents
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Transcript: The ROI of Email Marketing
Email consistently delivers the best marketing ROI, but what drives these great results? We set off to learn just that.
Email ROI continues to be high
According to the State of Email report 2025, for every $1 marketing leaders spend on email marketing:
- 35% receive $10-$36 in return
- 30% receive $36-50 in return
- 5% receive more than $50 in return
21% of marketing leaders do not measure ROI, which is down from 36% in 2023.
What type of email drives the highest ROI per industry?
- B2B: Customer engagement emails
- B2C: Promotional emails
- D2C: Newsletters
- Agencies and professional services: Newsletters
- Tech: Customer engagement emails
- Retail: Promotional emails
How companies measure email marketing’s contribution to overall business goals
- 30% analyze brand awareness metrics
- 36% use multi-channel attribution models to measure email marketing’s role
- 39% assess email’s impact on customer retention or loyalty
- 41% direct revenue attribution to email marketing campaigns
- 44% marketing qualified leads (MQLs) and/ or conversion rates from marketing emails
- 59% analyze customer engagement metrics (e.g. opens, click through rate (CTR), bounce rates, etc.)
ROI by industry
- Media, publishing, events, sports, & entertainment: 32:1
- Software & technology: 36:1
- Marketing, PR, & advertising agency: 42:1
- Retail, ecommerce, & consumer goods: 45:1
These insights are derived from Litmus’ 2020 State of Email Survey of more than 2,000 marketing professionals worldwide.
Ways to increase email ROI
How can you get even more from the almighty email dollar? Here are the strategies proven to increase ROI of email marketing:
- Run A/B tests on your emails often
- Use dynamic content or personalized content
- Utilize interactive elements, like GIFs
- Leverage external email analytics tools (like integrations, such as the Salesforce Marketing Cloud integration)
- Exercise an extensive checklist for pre-send testing
How Litmus boosts your email ROI
Litmus is designed to empower your team to send more effective, on-brand emails at scale. The good news? Brands that work with Litmus see positive results.
- Litmus Personalize helps you deliver relevant, engaging content that your subscribers will love.
- Litmus Email Previews eliminate email errors so subscribers have a great experience, every time.
- Litmus Spam Testing catches errors and helps you fix them before they cause your email to land in spam—and generate no ROI.
- Litmus Email Analytics helps marketers understand exactly what’s work and what’s not. In fact, brands that use Litmus Email Analytics achieve a 43% higher ROI than those that don’t.
More insights to increase your email ROI are waiting for you
Get a more in-depth look at what impacts email ROI in our CMO’s Guide to Email Marketing ROI.
Where did we get all this data? These insights are derived from Litmus’ 2025 State of Email Survey of nearly 500 marketing professionals worldwide.
Go beyond opens and clicks
Brands that use Litmus Email Analytics see a 43% higher ROI than those that don’t. See what you’re missing. Learn more.
Lindsey is a Sr. Content Marketing Manager at Litmus.
