The struggle is real for marketers when it comes to getting emails delivered to inboxes these days. Now that 48.16 percent of all global emails are marked as junk email, automated spam filters are more vigilant than ever.
The new European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will only make things worse before it makes things better. In the meantime, the GDPR “apocalypse” is still wreaking havoc on email permissions and contact lists (though you could read our blog post on how to bounce back).
This leaves marketers with two fundamental problems: First, their email marketing program may not be reaching audiences on the desired scale, even if they are using the best email marketing software. And second, they need to wrap their heads around the many factors – both technological and contextual – that affect deliverability rates, and ultimately the success of their entire email marketing strategy.
For a fast way of getting a handle on the situation, we just published our latest Selligent eBook 3 Secrets of Unstoppable Email Deliverability: Managing Sender Reputation, Avoiding Blacklists, and Getting to the Inbox.
In it, you will learn about the full scope of factors that contribute to your organization’s email reputation (and no, it’s not just IP reputation but much more). Plus, the 12-page eBook provides best practices for obtaining marketing opt-in from consumers, practicing email list hygiene and boosting your deliverability rates while steering clear of spam traps and blacklists – especially if you are using email marketing automation.
Please know from the start that we define email deliverability as the measure of how many messages actually reach the inboxes of their intended recipients. Deliverability is not to be confused with similar-sounding metrics such as delivery rate or delivered rate. These stats merely indicate that messages have been sent successfully or reached the target server without bouncing, but they still may be filtered as spam.
Sounds confusing? Let us help cut through the clutter by highlighting the email deliverability stats that really matter for your email marketing optimization:
Click-to-open rate – the clicks in relation to number of emails opened (tracks engagement better than just open rates).
Unsubscribe rate – the rate of of users opting out of email lists. Ask why it happened: Too many emails? Not relevant to individuals?
Complaint rate – reflects dissatisfied users. Higher complaints than unsubscribes? Maybe your opt-out process needs fixing.
Hard bounce rates can be caused by poor list hygiene – and will land you in spam traps before you know it.
Email server uptime stats where there’s a huge difference between 99% and 99.9% availability.
In the next step, fire up your marketing software and generate some detailed reports around your email deliverability metrics. This will provide you with a comprehensive health check of your email marketing strategy – a canary in the coal mine, if you will – and an opportunity to take control of your email rep and customer engagement.
Oh, and although spamming is the last thing on your mind, it never hurts to check whether your IP or domain has ended up on one of the big global DNS-based blacklists. For more actionable pro tips to boost your next email marketing campaign, make sure to download our new eBook for free today.
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