How to monitor email marketing results

Unsubscription Rate

After you click the unsubscribe link in the email, the email address of the subscriber will be deleted from the database. The email marketing system background should record the email address.

Mail delivery rate

The total number of sent mails minus the number of returned mails received is the number of sent mails. By dividing the number of delivered mails by the total number of sent mails, the delivery rate is obtained. The delivery rate shows the proportion of emails that have entered the user's mailbox.

However, entering the mailbox does not necessarily mean that the user can see this email. Emails may be directly in the spam folder, and users may delete the emails only after reading the title. These emails are also calculated within the delivered number. Therefore, in practice, the delivery rate is a number that must be known but has little practical significance. It is used to measure the real situation of the email that the user sees. The error is relatively large.

In practice, the mail opening rate or reading rate is more meaningful than the delivery rate.

Email opening rate/reading rate

The email reading rate shows the percentage of emails opened by users.

The measurement method is to embed a 1x1 tracking image file in the HTML Version of the email. The name of the image file to be tracked varies. For example, the name of the first album is 200801.jpg, and the name of the image to be tracked in the second email is t200802.jpg. When the user opens the email, the mail client will call the tracking image file located on the website server. The number of times the image file is called from the server log to know the number of times the email is read.

Like Website access, this file can also be called by independent IP addresses and the total number of calls. Each Independent IP address represents a user. The number of calls of an independent IP address divided by the total number of mails sent is a relatively accurate email reading rate. The total number of image file review requests is usually higher, because the same user may open this email multiple times.

For example, the format is
However, this requires that you have the permission to read the log information of the IIS server or Apache server. The log information records the number of times each file is read every day, as long as your image files are dedicated for mass mailing and are not referenced by other webpages or on your own website, the statistical results are close to the real data.

Link CTR

Add a specific tracking code to the email link. In this way, the recipient prefers to click the link in the mail header navigation? Or do you prefer to click the recommendation link in the body? Or the call link at the end of the email? With these statistics, you can view the layout and content of the email to see where the user's eyes are usually attracted? What types of wording and content attract users to click on the link?

Email click rate is a more accurate indicator for measuring the effectiveness of e-mail marketing. It indicates that the user not only reads your email, but also has an interest in the products you promote.

Email list registration Conversion Rate

That is, the ratio of the number of registered users to the number of independent IP addresses accessing the website. The measurement method is to refer to the number of independent IP addresses in the website traffic statistics, the number of confirmed webpages displayed after submitting the e-Magazine registration form, and the total number of users who finally select to join the e-Magazine Database.

By dividing the number of display times on the confirmation page by the number of independent IP addresses, the registration conversion rate is obtained, but not the final registration conversion rate. Dividing the total number of e-Magazine databases by the number of independent IP addresses is the final e-Magazine conversion rate. The calculation is based on a certain period of time, such as the conversion rate obtained by day, week, or month.

Generally, the sales conversion rate of e-commerce websites is normal at around 1%. The conversion rate of email lists or magazines should be higher, and 5%-20% is normal.

Another metric similar to the conversion rate is the total number of subscribers, which is also the most gratifying figure for webmasters. Generally, it is impossible for a website to reach tens of thousands of e-Magazine subscribers. It is normal to add more than a dozen or even 20 subscribers every day. It can reach thousands of subscribers every year. In a few years, you have tens of thousands of subscribers.

Pay attention to the growth rate of the number of subscribers. When the website traffic remains stable, if the growth rate changes significantly, the webmaster should check whether there are technical problems? Are subscribed gifts out of date and no longer attractive? If necessary, conduct a user survey on the website to see what causes the decline in the growth rate of subscribers.

Detect and delete invalid addresses

After registering the email list, it does not mean that each email address can receive an email. After each email is sent, you will usually receive a portion of the returned emails. The system needs to automatically check the returned emails and delete invalid addresses.

There are two types of returned mails: Soft return and hard return, which need to be treated differently.

Hard Return indicates that the email address does not exist. For example, the free email account has been canceled or deleted, the Free Email provider has stopped the service, or the domain name does not exist or has expired, the user entered an incorrect email address or spelling error. You should delete invalid addresses that have been hard returned directly because it is impossible to correct them.

Soft return indicates that the mailbox is full, or the recipient's email server has a technical problem temporarily, or a temporary problem occurs between the sending server and the receiving server. The system should retain the soft return address, because the problem may be solved after a period of time, and the mail can be delivered normally. However, if a soft return always occurs for the same email address three to five times in a row, the system should delete the address. It is unlikely that a technical problem has occurred for several months. If the mailbox is full for a few months, the user may not use this mailbox anymore.