List Rental Prices Level Off Across Major Categories in Summer '09

Consumer email prices continue to decline while b-to-b international data remains steady.

By Chandra Johnson-Greene
Wednesday, July 22, 2009

List rental prices have begun to stabilize across major categories, according to Worldata’s Summer 2009 List Price Index, with b-to-b international data showing only a small decrease from last quarter while consumer email prices continue to decline.

The largest price decrease occurred in the Permission-Based B-to-C category, which dropped $50/M from Summer 2008. This category also had the largest percent decrease at 29.41 percent. Permission-Based International Email remains steady with a slight decrease from last quarter as businesses expand their marketing budgets globally. The average international file is $404/M, decreasing $3/M from the last two previous quarters.

The lowest price decreases occurred within the Business Mags/Controlled and Business Merchandise Buyers categories, which both dropped $4/M from last year. The lowest percent decrease also occurred in the Business Mags/Controlled category with a 2.70 percent decrease. The largest percentage increases occurred in the Newsletters and Public Sector categories with a 4.29 percent and 2.35 percent increase respectively.

Permission-Based Email B-to-B is the highest-priced category, with a Summer 2009 straight average price of $288/M, a decrease of $11/M from last year. Public Sector ranks the second highest-priced category range, with Summer 2009 straight average prices of $174/M, increasing $4/M from last year. Donors remains the lowest-priced category with an average list price of $84/M, increasing $1/M over last year.

“This quarter we are noticing prices within many of the categories have started to level-off, a sign of the times that the economy is attempting to stabilize,” Ray Tesi, SVP, Worldata, said in a statement. “I think it is important to note that although there is a huge difference from last summer to now, from quarter-to-quarter we are starting to see prices even out. Consumer email files are still dropping, showing the most price activity from last summer to this summer. The consumer market is still evolving in order to keep marketers interested.”

The Worldata List Price Index serves as a barometer for the pricing and trending of all list rental pricing and is reported quarterly, providing a comparison of list prices during any given 12-month period and tacking price fluctuations, as cost per thousand (CPM), for lists in various categories.