Mobile engagement platform Leanplum has released a report entitled Unlocking Engagement & Growth With Emojis, that it says confirms the effectiveness of emoji usage in push notifications and emails. The data verifies that emojis are significantly more likely to influence mobile engagement and aid retention.

The report follows on from a similar study released last year. For this year’s report, Leanplum analysed 300m emails and push notifications worldwide between 1 June 2017 and 1 June 2018. Leanplums platform captures more than 24bn mobile data points daily and delivers over 50m messages every hour. 

The report found that emoji usage continues to rise. The average number of emojis used per message and the percentage of messages including at least one emoji both doubled in the past year. Emails with emojis are opened 66 per cent more than emails without emojis, while push notifications with emojis are opened 254 per cent more than push notifications without emojis. And apps that use emojis experience 26 per cent fewer uninstalls.

“We used Leanplum to test the effectiveness of emojis in push notification campaigns,” said Joanna Hill, head of digital at Miss Selfridge. “In one of our tests, we saw an 81 per cent lift in open rates and a 363 per cent lift in revenue from the message with emojis.”

Joyce Solano, SVP of global marketing at Leanplum, said the study confirms that emojis continue to be an impactful marketing tool for driving mobile growth. “Emoji usage in mobile messages doubled this year, and user engagement tripled as a response to these delightful campaigns,” said Solano. “Emojis convey emotion and personality from brands, which help marketers deliver in-the-moment engagement and build long-lasting user retention.”

You can download the full report here.