Email marketing is an essential tool used by professional marketers today; many marketers are moving up to marketing automation systems that include email marketing, Web site tracking, automatic lead nurturing, and more. All vendors in this space offer helpful campaign summary reports that show delivery and bounce rates, email open percentages, click through rates, etc.
Some of the email report information is easy to understand, some is more subtle. Here’s some additional info that may be helpful:
Email open rates – the percentage of delivered emails that were unique opens. In an earlier post, tracking in marketing automation systems, I revealed that many more people open and view your emails than you can track. Currently, our B2B clients are seeing email open rates in the 14% to 25% range. The variance depends on a number of factors but especially list quality.
Unique email opens – This is the actual number of individuals that opened the email. So you send the email campaign to 100 people, 90 are delivered, there are 18 unique opens, you get a 20% open rate.
Total email opens – Why aren’t unique opens and total opens the same?
1) the contact could have opened it multiple times
2) the contact may have forwarded the email to other people. The tracking still records the opens back to their record. Depending on the email system you can get some fascinating clues. In the past I have been able to see multiple opens at about the same time for IP addresses in different parts of the U.S. – obviously the email was forwarded and opened by different people in different locations. This is usually a good thing – unless it’s competitive research – people open and forward emails that are of interest to them so that means your company or offering is of interest.
Unique clicks – This is the actual number of individuals that clicked the link in your email. So you send the email campaign to 100 people, 90 are delivered, there are 2 unique clicks, you get a 2% unique click rate. Currently, our B2B clients are seeing email click through rates in the 1% to 3% range but in certain situations some clients have seen click through rates as high as 5% to 12%. The variance depends on the clarity and value of the email message and the perceived value of the information available by clicking the link. Once again, list quality is a big factor here.
Total clicks – Why aren’t unique clicks and total clicks the same?
1) the contact could have clicked the link multiple times
2) the contact may have forwarded the email to other people and they may have also clicked the link. The tracking still records the clicks back to their record. Depending on the email system you can get some fascinating clues. Like with the email open tracking, in the past I have been able to see multiple clicks at about the same time for IP addresses in different parts of the U.S. – obviously the email was forwarded and link clicked by different people in different locations. It’s likely that your company or offering is of interest.
Until next time,
Garth
