The attention span of a modern person is less than that of a goldfish.
If in 2000 the average attention span was 12 seconds, now it has dropped to 8. The goldfish, in turn, is able to concentrate its attention for 9 seconds.

This is due to the popularity of high-tech gadgets. A modern person uses the Internet at the same time, watches TV and plays games, which negatively affects brain activity, as he simply cannot keep several tasks in focus at once.
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Microsoft has conducted a study on how modern technologies affect the attention span of their users. 112 people took part in it. Participants were asked questions that required a different concentration of attention and at the same time an EEG was filmed.
Analysis of the collected data showed that the average concentration of attention of participants was 8 seconds.

Upon receipt of the newsletter, the subscriber decides to read it within 8 seconds or not. At the same time, the amount of text does not affect this indicator at all. This is confirmed by the laboratory analysis of the influence of context on the decision-making process at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology.

Experiment "Letter"

The experiment was that consonant letters of the Russian alphabet appeared on the screen in front of the subject twice a second. The subjects had to press the Ctrl keys with their left and right hand without looking at the keyboard. The decision in this case comes down to the moment when the hand is selected and the key is pressed. The subjects also had to memorize the letter on the screen at the time of the decision and press a key. After pressing one of the two Ctrl keys, the stream of changing letters stops, and a 2 × 2 table appears on the screen: the three cells of the table are filled with the last three before pressing the Ctrl key with letters from the stream, and the fourth cell contains the # symbol. Then the subject chooses which letter he saw at the time of making his decision. If this letter is not in the table, then he is asked to press #. This procedure is repeated 10 times.

The results of the study showed that the subjects made a decision on average 8 seconds. That is, our brain is able to activate certain sections, process information and make a decision in this short time. Then he switches to the next task.

A logical question arises: what should be the distribution in this situation so that it is opened and read?

Open or not open? That is the question .

Earlier in the blog, we have already touched on this topic , trying to form the rules for inclusion in the newsletters for such a short period of time. But let's look at the problem in more detail.

Our company conducted a study in which 18 people took part. The subjects were given an unfamiliar text, which they read for 8 seconds, to decide whether they would read it to the end. Then the number of processed characters was counted and the arithmetic average was calculated. Here are the results were obtained:



Average = 483 characters in 8 seconds.

What involves?

Factors of involvement and interest in the mailing list for each subscriber will be their own. But mailings with bright unique images and the registered benefits for subscribers, as a rule, are read more often.



This newsletter from the company "Four Paws" is quite bright, there is a beautiful image and a large call-to-action button. Each recipient pays attention primarily to the center of the mailing, where the image is located, and then his gaze falls on the CTA. See and remember this newsletter is much easier than a canvas of text.
The main difference of this pet store newsletters is kindness. The motive of care, love for pets and an easy share of "mimicity" passes through all their mailings as a red thread. Taking into account the fact that the main target body is women, such a device cannot but work.



A greeting letter from LinguaLeo uses the gift as an engaging anchor. There are no longer long greetings in verse. Immediately action.



The Harley-Davidson newsletter is original in that, in fact, leaves no choice but to click on the button. Here "either with us or against us." A conciseness in the text and design allows you to view the entire newsletter at a glance.



You can get involved in the newsletter not only with gifts. In addition to the bright design, the content will play great, as is the case with the World of WarCraft mailing list. Appealing to the subscriber as a hero, dragging him into the whirlpool of adventure will undoubtedly interest the representative of the target audience of the game distribution.

From all of the above, we can conclude that the human brain adapts to the technologies surrounding it and a decrease in the time of concentration of attention can be a side effect of such an adaptation. Marketers, in turn, should monitor these processes and improve their mailings based on the interests and preferences of Central Asia.

Konstantin Makarov, CEO of the SendPulse mailing service