TrueInsight Newsletter

Talk Tracking to Me
The Key Email Marketing Metrics You Need to Know Now

The beauty of email marketing—and Internet marketing in general—is that it is the most trackable advertising medium on the planet. In a relative instant, you can tell what’s working, what isn’t, and adjust your email copy, creative, and offers accordingly.

But as anyone who’s ever wondered what a soft bounce is can tell you, email tracking comes with a language all its own. To help you learn the language, TruePresence has defined the key email marketing metrics you need to know before your next campaign goes out.

Emails Delivered:
The number of messages that were accepted by the recipients’ servers. Unfortunately, it won’t tell you if the email made it past corporate or secondary filters, but it is nevertheless a good measure of your email list’s “cleanliness.” And since most email service providers (ESPs) charge by volume, it’s best to keep your list in tip-top shape.

Bounces:
The number of attempted sends that could not be delivered—and another good way to tell if your list needs further scrubbing. A hard bounce is an email that is permanently undeliverable due to address or domain errors. Scrap those addresses from your list if your ESP doesn’t automatically do so. A soft bounce is an email that is temporarily undeliverable due to reasons like a full mailbox or an inactive account. These addresses may still be valid to your list, and you may even want to try resending your email to those addresses a few days later.

Unsubscribes:
The number of subscribers who asked to be removed from your email list. Some ESPs, like TrueMailer, automatically remove unsubscribers from your email lists. If your ESP does not, make sure you manually remove them immediately—or else run the risk of permanently damaging your customer relationship. If you’re manually removing unsubscribers, also be sure to check back on this stat a few days after your campaign, as people may not unsubscribe immediately.

Emails Opened:
Finally—a metric to get excited about! This measures the number of subscribers who opened your email, which is half the battle in email marketing. The open rate is also the best means of measuring the effectiveness of your subject line. If you’re not already testing subject lines, try this simple test for your next campaign: send out two identical emails to two different test groups—but use a different subject line on each—and see which subject line generates the highest open rate. Do this type of testing repeatedly, and you’ll begin to gauge what kind of messaging resonates with your target audience.

Clicks or Click-Throughs:
This one’s a biggie. It measures the number of subscribers who clicked on a link within your email. In other words, how many people found something in your email that compelled them to take an action? Often, clicks can be measured in greater detail—which subscribers clicked on which links, and then what actions they took from there. Pay close attention to these details; they’ll tell you what’s triggering the purchasing decisions in your customer base.

Now that you understand email tracking a little better, your next step is to define the objectives for your email campaign. Do you want to drive repeat sales? Increase site traffic? Or simply build your brand awareness? Once you’ve laid out clear objectives, you can identify the key metrics that are most important for you. Happy tracking.