Analysis of 2011 Electoral Roll Identifies Stabilising Opt Out Rate and Highlights Worst Hit Areas

Leading marketing services and credit reference agency Callcredit Information Group has today published figures illustrating that the overall opt out rate for the 2011 edited Electoral Roll has decreased for the first time, but that regional variations are still substantial.

With 98% of Electoral Rolls now received Callcredit have identified that opt out rates may now be stabilising with a 1% decrease on opt out rates for this year. The news is positive for marketers but it follows many years of rapid increases and hides big regional variations between Local Authorities, with opt out rates differing by up to 70%.

With many marketers looking to the edited electoral roll to verify their own customer data or to target potential prospects, the fact that some local authorities have more than 75% of people opted out of the edited roll is challenging, particularly for businesses based in those areas.

The analysis illustrates the following key findings:

• 41.6% of all councils have more than half of their residents opting out. This shows a significant increase on the figure of 39.9% reported in 2010 and 32.3% reported in 2009.
• 16.3% of all councils have opt out rates in excess of 60%. Again this is a major increase from previous years; 14.7% in 2010 and 13.0% in 2009.

Chris Savage, Managing Director of Callcredit Information Group - Marketing Solutions division comments:

"The Edited Electoral Roll continues to play a vital part in the direct marketing world today. The good news is that the opt out rate is plateauing but it is still at a significantly high level, which continues to concern us both as a business and as an Industry. Large regional variations still exist which make it difficult for marketers wishing to verify customer data or target direct mail campaigns and direct email marketing.

"There are however data sources available that can assist direct marketers to infill data gaps, particularly in high opt out areas. Callcredit's Core consumer universe is one such example. It provides marketers with continued access to almost 42 million UK consumers, bridging the opt out gap with a substantial volume of valuable prospects. For example the worst council areas show opt outs in excess of 70%. In these areas Core is able to provide data to fill as much as 50% of the gap."

To find out more about Callcredit's consumer universe Core, click here.

The following tables indicate the lowest and highest local authorities in terms of opt out rates:

10 Highest Opt-Out Local Authority Areas:

10 Lowest Opt-Out Local Authority Areas:

The below difference shows the difference that Callcredit data can make when looking at the areas with the highest opt out rates.