Email remains one of the best ways to generate leads and find new clients, but it can be difficult to know if your email campaigns are successfully building your brand or signing new cases if you aren’t monitoring how users are interacting with them.
Here are three important email metrics to watch in 2022 to keep tabs on the effectiveness of your email campaigns.
- Click Rate
Your click rate is the number of email recipients who clicked on any link in your email. It helps you determine if your subject lines and calls-to-action are working or if they need some fine-tuning, and it can also help you determine if your emails are arriving in valid inboxes as intended.
- Conversions
How many people are filling out forms on your website or landing pages? And how did they navigate to your site? It’s important to review your firm’s Google Analytics to see how many form submissions were made by email subscribers who arrived at your website via the links in your emails.
You can keep tabs on website traffic via emails by appending UTMs to your email links and checking your email service provider’s (ESP) reporting. Many popular platforms like HubSpot, MailChimp, Constant Contact, and Emma provide this feature.
- Unsubscribes
Monitor unsubscribes to learn about your audience’s preferences. Ideally, your unsubscribe rate should be less than 0.05%. Keep in mind that new contacts typically unsubscribe at a higher rate than longer-term subscribers.
Your unsubscribe rate should be consistent over time. It’s important to investigate any sudden increases or spikes in unsubscribes.
What About Email Open Rate?
Tracking email open rate is a vital part of any email campaign, but Apple Mail’s privacy changes in 2021 changed the game for measuring engagement with Apple device users. Last year, Apple allowed users to opt into new privacy settings that disable tracking pixels, making it more difficult for email marketers to reliably determine when subscribers open emails.
This feature is called Mail Privacy Protection, and it’s available to all Apple Mail users on all Apple devices, including iPhones, iPads, and Macs. In addition to disabling pixel tracking, it can also mask their IP addresses.
Because of this major change, many email marketers are turning to clicks and conversions to better understand performance rather than relying on open rates alone.
What You Can Do in Response to Apple’s Privacy Settings Change
Thankfully, there are still many ways to track email campaign performance and increase their effectiveness so you can reach the leads who need your services the most.
- Refocus on Calls to Action
You already know that a strong call to action is essential for effective email marketing. In 2022, continue performing A/B tests for your audience and ensure every email asks users to take an action that is both clear and compelling.
- Build Exclusion Lists for Accurate Reporting
Identify the segment of your audience that uses email clients like Outlook, Gmail, or Android devices to view emails. These users can still be tracked via pixel tracking for more accurate data.
- Obtain Client Email Information
Certain ESPs, such as MailChimp and Emma, make it easy to obtain client email data. If your ESP doesn’t provide this feature, you can use a third-party platform like Litmus to create tracking codes.
- Compare Email Open Rates of Various Platforms
Comparing your overall open rates to the open rate of confirmed non-Apple Mail users can help you understand the impact that Apple Mail users and their new privacy settings have on your overall email open rate.
- Connect Your Case Management Platform to Your Marketing Database
Use an API or webhook between your case management software and your ESP. This can help you determine which digital media—such as email, digital ads, or organic social posts—influence leads before they decided to contact your firm.
Want Help with Your Email Marketing Efforts? Contact Us Today.
Email marketing evolves from year-to-year, and Apple’s privacy settings update in 2021 represented a huge shift for the industry. If the complexity of tracking email campaign performance is making your head swim, you aren’t alone—but we can help.
Interested in learning how cj’s Integrated Digital team can take your email marketing efforts to the next level? Drop us a line at askus@cjadvertising.com.
