Quick question: How do you measure your email campaign process? Your focus must drive you to email open rate and click-through rate.

This is how you think about the progress of your email campaign.

Now it’s my turn! 

Surprisingly, I’m also in your category, but I want to tell you more about it. As click-through rate is entirely dependent upon the open rate, why not first improve your email open rate?

There are many misconceptions about this so let’s discuss what email open rate actually is.

What is an email open rate?

Logically, the email open rate is the number of emails that people open.

But the real logic is more than that. The email is only counted as opened when: 

  • Images in your email can be viewed in the preview pane or in a complete view of the email using the reader 
  • Any link/CTA loads that can be clicked by the reader 

This is the case where you can actually say the email is opened by someone.

After getting to know about it, you should know how to calculate the open rate.

It is calculated by a formula used by email service providers (ESPs). The formula is:

The ratio between the total number of people who opened the email and the number of emails actually delivered.

Or you can say the ratio between the total number of people who opened the email and the number of emails sent that didn’t bounce (i.e. reached the recipient inbox). 

For example, you send 80 emails and out of them, 10 bounce which means the total number of emails delivered is 70. Out of 70 emails, 10 are opened, which means your email open rate is 14%. Got it? Great!

Let’s move forward!

A quick spam checker 

To prevent email from landing in the spam folder, you can also access a free spam checker tool to ensure your email account is able to send messages.

This will clearly tell you which email client is being sent to spam and which one has the ability to successfully send emails to the primary inbox.

Why a high open rate is so impactful for your email campaign

Before you get more people to read your emails, you first need to understand where you stand. Either your email inbox deliverability is fine or your emails go to spam.

This is based on how well your email is warmed up. Email warm-up emphasizes building a sender reputation that allows your email to land into the inbox, not in spam.

Whether your email account is old or new, you have to build your reputation by sending emails gradually to valid users. It is a prolonged process, but I’ve got a solution. 

Warm Up Your Email is the tool where you can simply set the campaign and the process of warming up your account is not difficult anymore.

They have a well-oriented sender reputation tool that delivers insightful results and makes your account safe and secure from spammers.

After making sure your emails are not landing in spam, you can observe the email deliverability rate over a period of time.

You might be curious about thinking your email deliverability indicated high but the open rate is still low. 

Emails open rate fluctuates and it’s normal. According to the report, the overall email open rate remained stable, around 24% globally.

But the sad news is it has dropped almost 16.97% in 2020. This is a normal phenomenon in email marketing.

Historical data predicts that in 2021, there will be a spike in the open rate graph globally, so we can expect a great impact on the open rate in 2021. 

How to get the maximum email open rate

Work hard on your subject line

The first impression is always crucial. Your recipients judge your email by its subject line.

Your audience does not respond to mind-numbingly boring headlines. Write compelling and meaningful ones that attract readers at first sight.

Write well-versed email copy

The power of words is to help, to heal, to find, and to humble, and when it comes to business email copywriting, you can pour all the positivity into it. 

Try to cement your story in a few words that show credibility, trust, and appreciation. But make sure you don’t trigger the spam words that can put you in the spam folder. 

Clean up the email list 

A healthy email list greatly impacts your sender reputation. If your email list isn’t clean, there is a high risk of landing in spam. 

Additionally, you can easily clean up your list with a free email validator tool that makes sure the list doesn’t contain any risky or blocked email that hurts your email open rate.

Time is everything so choose wisely

I really enjoy reading emails in the daytime when I am at my cabin; however, it frustrates me if I receive emails when I reach home. What about you? 

To be honest, you will see improvements when your email delivers at the right time and on the right day.

Let’s test the right send time by analyzing the email open rate of your previous campaign. You can find out your best day and time for your email campaign.

Stabilize the frequency of your sends

If your email is not warmed up, it is the bells and whistles for your account that you couldn’t send email to thousands of people. 

Set the frequency of your email and gradually increase it after confirmation of your email deliverability.

Every industry is a little bit different in marketing. That’s why you have to consider your audience after warming up your account and setting the monthly email frequency.

Apply A/B testing on the subject line

If you’re not sure about your emails in terms of content or subject lines, you can go for A/B testing. Make 3-4 subject lines and see which one gets the best result for you. 

Optimize your effort by A/B testing and increase the chances to get high open rates on your email. You can easily recognize what kind of subject line brings the best open rate.

Be personalized and polite

If you got an email with your name and some basic information, you’d likely feel it was meant for you. You can follow the same practice by personalizing the message.

Don’t forget your old subscribers

Your competitors and your customers are the essence of your business. A strong campaign is needed when it comes to growing your business. 

Your old subscribers are the ones that previously wanted to talk to you and the chances of email inbox deliverability is high but for some reason, they’ve forgotten you.

Throw a personalized email into their inbox to catch their attention and it’ll be the magic for your open rate.

Leave them wanting more

Anticipation is a strong motivator. It makes people curious about your product and message.

Anticipation can increase your open rate by making your audience take your desired action.

Imagine, if you accidentally missed the weekly email and your subscribers reminded you that “you didn’t send today’s email.”

Conclusion

At the end of the day, you should know the progress in your email open rate. For this, you have to monitor your open rate and try to maintain all the possible factors to get the results you want.

Warm Up Your Email is a tool that can help you improve your email deliverability and give you access to this dashboard where you can see the overall status of your email campaigns.