Mailgenius guides

Email Deliverability Monitoring: The Ultimate Guide to Tracking the Right Metrics

Navigating the intricate world of email deliverability goes beyond just adhering to best practices; it’s only half the battle won. To truly ensure your emails find their rightful place in a recipient’s main inbox, it’s imperative to monitor their performance meticulously.

But with a sea of metrics out there, which ones truly matter? Dive in as we unravel the essential email deliverability metrics you should be zeroing in on and why they’re pivotal to your email campaign’s success.

Note: Monitor and test with MailGenius to ensure your emails shine. Dive in with 3 FREE email tests and get feedback that propels your messages straight to the primary inbox.

What is Email Deliverability?

Before diving into the metrics, it’s essential to understand what email deliverability is. In simple terms, it’s the ability of an email to reach the recipient’s inbox without being flagged as spam or bouncing back. Several factors can affect deliverability, from the content of the email to the sender’s reputation.

Key Metrics to Monitor

Data is your guiding star. Monitoring the right metrics can illuminate the path to optimal deliverability, ensuring your messages reach their destination and make a lasting impact. From gauging the health of your email list to understanding recipient engagement, these key metrics serve as the pulse of your campaigns. Let’s delve into the numbers shaping your email strategy’s success.

Delivery Rates

The delivery rate is a foundational metric in email deliverability. It provides a clear picture of how many of your emails are successfully reaching their intended recipients versus those that aren’t.

The delivery rate measures the percentage of emails that were successfully delivered to recipients’ inboxes without any hindrance, such as bounces or being flagged as spam. It’s crucial to differentiate between emails that are merely “sent” and those that are “delivered.” An email can be sent but may not necessarily reach the recipient’s inbox due to various reasons.

A high delivery rate is indicative of a healthy list and good sender reputation for your emails. On the other hand, a low delivery rate can signal potential issues with your email practices, such as sending to outdated email addresses or having content that triggers spam filters.

How To Calculate Delivery Rates

To determine your delivery rate, use the formula:

(Number of Emails Delivered / Number of Emails Sent) x 100

For instance, if you sent out 1,000 emails and 950 were delivered, your delivery rate would be 95%.

Monitoring Delivery Rates

There are several sophisticated tools available that offer insights into your delivery rate and also come equipped with features to identify potential deliverability challenges. By diligently monitoring this metric using these platforms, businesses can proactively address any issues. This ensures that their emails consistently reach their intended recipients, maximizing the impact of their email campaigns.

Many tools offer both shared and dedicated IP setups to optimize delivery rates and bolster sender reputation. They actively monitor shared IP addresses and act to ensure poor senders don’t hinder your emails from reaching recipients.

Inbox Placement Rate

Inbox Placement Rate (IPR) is a crucial metric in email deliverability. It measures the percentage of sent emails that successfully land in the recipient’s main inbox, as opposed to other locations like the spam or junk folder. There are many tools like MailGenius that allow you to test inbox placement and improve your deliverability.

Achieving a high IPR ensures that your emails are visible and accessible to your recipients, increasing the likelihood of engagement. Emails that land in the spam or junk folder often go unnoticed, leading to missed opportunities for communication, sales, or other desired actions. A low IPR can indicate various email deliverability issues, from the content of the email being flagged as spam to a tarnished sender reputation.

If your emails aren’t reaching the main inbox (low IPR), you’re missing out on a significant portion of potential engagement, given the vast number of daily email users.

How to Calculate IPR:

To determine your IPR, use the following formula:

(Number of Emails Landed in the Main Inbox / Total Number of Emails Sent) x 100

For instance, if you sent 1,000 emails and 850 landed in the main inbox, your IPR would be 85%.

Strategies for Effective IPR Monitoring

To effectively assess IPR, it’s crucial to set up tests that mimic real-world email sending scenarios. Once these test emails are dispatched, detailed reports can be generated to show where the email was placed across various ISPs. Such insights provide a lucid picture of IPR performance across different email providers. If the IPR is found lacking for specific ISPs, it’s essential to delve into the feedback, making necessary adjustments. This could range from refining email content, modulating sending frequencies, to incorporating authentication protocols. Regular IPR assessments, especially amidst changes to email campaigns or overarching strategies, ensure continuous awareness of placement rates, enabling timely and effective optimizations.

Spam Placement Rate (SPR):

Spam Placement Rate is a metric that quantifies the percentage of your sent emails that end up in recipients’ spam or junk folders. It’s the opposite of the Inbox Placement Rate and is a direct indicator of potential issues with your email deliverability.

A high SPR is a red flag for email marketers. Emails that land in the spam folder are less likely to be seen or engaged with by recipients. Moreover, a consistent pattern of emails being flagged as spam can harm your sender reputation, making it even more challenging to reach inboxes in the future. Monitoring and minimizing your SPR is crucial to ensure the effectiveness of your email campaigns.

A high SPR can lead to increased spam complaints, further deteriorating deliverability.

How to Calculate SPR:

To determine your SPR, use the following formula:

(Number of Emails Landed in the Spam Folder / Total Number of Emails Sent) x 100

For instance, if you sent 1,000 emails and 50 landed in the spam folder, your SPR would be 5%.

Monitoring SPR with MailGenius

Utilizing deliverability tools like MailGenius can be pivotal in assessing and reducing your Spam Placement Rate. Start by conducting a spam test: send your email to the designated test address provided by the platform. This action mimics how various ISPs and email providers might interpret your email. Subsequently, MailGenius offers a comprehensive report pinpointing potential red flags that could lead your email to be categorized as spam, from specific content triggers to technical oversights like absent SPF records.

To enhance your email deliverability, it’s crucial to act on this feedback. Refine your email’s content, design, or underlying technical configurations as needed. Adopting this proactive stance can significantly diminish your SPR in subsequent campaigns. Moreover, consistent monitoring, particularly when introducing major alterations to your email content or layout, ensures you remain informed about potential spam indicators, facilitating timely interventions.

Hard and Soft Bounces

A bounced email is one that couldn’t be delivered to the recipient’s inbox. Email service providers (ESPs) indicate the reason for an email’s rejection (bounce) using the error message details from the receiving server.

Bounces are categorized into two types: hard and soft. Hard bounces are permanent delivery failures, usually due to invalid or non-existent email addresses. Soft bounces are temporary issues, such as a recipient’s mailbox being full or a server being temporarily down.

Monitoring and addressing bounces is crucial for several reasons. First, a high bounce rate can harm your sender reputation, leading to lower deliverability rates in the future. Second, consistently sending to invalid addresses can result in your domain being blacklisted. Lastly, by removing bounced addresses, you can maintain a clean and active email list, ensuring that your campaigns reach a more engaged audience.

By fixing bounces, you can maximize the ROI of your email campaigns and ensure your messages reach their intended recipients.

Tools can help identify and address deliverability issues, including bounces. By using their pre-send and in-flight email deliverability testing, you can proactively spot potential bounce issues and take corrective measures.

How to Calculate Bounce Rates

To determine your bounce rate, use the following formula:

(Total Number of Bounced Emails / Total Number of Emails Sent) x 100

For instance, if you sent 1,000 emails and 30 bounced, your bounce rate would be 3%.

Monitoring Bounce Rates

Various email marketing platforms offer robust tools to effectively monitor and address email bounces. Before dispatching your email campaign, running a deliverability test using these platforms is advisable. Such tests can preemptively identify potential issues that might result in bounces, ensuring you’re better prepared.

Once your campaign is sent, delve into the provided analytics to gain insights into both hard and soft bounces. This data will pinpoint which addresses are causing delivery failures. It’s essential to act on this information: promptly remove addresses causing hard bounces from your list. For soft bounces, consider a temporary suppression, giving the recipient’s mailbox a chance to resolve the issue before you attempt re-sending. Regular and consistent monitoring, especially when integrating new contacts into your list, ensures you’re always on top of potential bounce challenges, allowing for proactive adjustments.

Engagement Rate

Engagement Rate is a metric that quantifies the level of interaction recipients have with your email. It encompasses various actions, including opening the email, clicking on links, replying, and more. In essence, it’s a measure of how compelling and relevant your email content is to your audience.

A high engagement rate is indicative of content that resonates with your audience. It means your emails are not only reaching the inbox but are also capturing the attention of recipients. ISPs (Internet Service Providers) often use engagement metrics to determine the deliverability of your future emails. High engagement can boost your sender reputation, ensuring better inbox placement, while low engagement can have the opposite effect.

By monitoring how many of your emails are opened, clicked, and replied to, you can gauge the effectiveness of your content and make necessary adjustments.

How to Calculate Engagement Rate

To determine your engagement rate, use the following formula:

(Number of Engaged Actions / Total Number of Emails Delivered) x 100

For instance, if you sent 1,000 emails, 800 were delivered, and 400 of those were engaged with (opened, clicked, etc.), your engagement rate would be 50%.

Monitoring Engagement

Various tools available in the market allow you to closely monitor the engagement metrics of your email campaigns. After dispatching your campaign, it’s essential to dive into the analytics provided by these platforms. These statistics will present a range of metrics, from the number of emails opened to clicks and replies.

Analyzing these metrics can reveal valuable insights into your audience’s behavior. For instance, identifying which subject lines garner the most opens or which calls-to-action lead to the most clicks can guide your future campaign strategies.

Open Rate

Open Rate is a metric that represents the percentage of recipients who opened your email out of the total number of emails delivered. It’s one of the primary indicators of the initial success of an email campaign, showing the level of interest or curiosity your email generated.

The Open Rate is a direct reflection of the effectiveness of your email’s subject line, sender name, and pre-header text. A high open rate suggests that your email was intriguing enough to prompt recipients to explore its content. A low open rate can indicate several issues: your emails might be landing in the spam folder, your subject line might not be compelling, or your sender reputation could be tarnished. Monitoring and optimizing for a high open rate is crucial to ensure the subsequent success of your email campaigns.

How to Calculate Open Rate:

To determine your open rate, use the following formula:

(Number of Emails Opened / Total Number of Emails Delivered) x 100

For instance, if you had 1,000 emails delivered and 250 of those were opened, your open rate would be 25%.

Monitoring Open Rate

Various email marketing platforms provide comprehensive tools to closely monitor the open rate of your campaigns. After dispatching your email campaign, it’s essential to delve into the analytics provided by these platforms. These statistics will offer a range of metrics, most notably the number of emails that were opened by recipients.

Analyzing this data can reveal insightful patterns. For instance, you might notice that certain subject lines consistently yield higher open rates. Armed with this knowledge, you can fine-tune your subject lines for subsequent campaigns.

Complaint Rate

The Complaint Rate is a metric that quantifies the percentage of recipients who marked your email as spam or junk. It’s calculated by dividing the number of spam complaints by the total number of emails delivered, then multiplying by 100 to get a percentage.

A high Complaint Rate is a severe red flag for email marketers. When recipients mark an email as spam, it signals to ISPs (Internet Service Providers) that the content might not be wanted or relevant. Consistent complaints can severely tarnish your sender reputation, leading to reduced deliverability rates in the future. It’s imperative to keep this rate as low as possible to ensure your emails reach their intended audience and to maintain a positive relationship with ISPs.

How to Calculate Complaint Rate

To determine your Complaint Rate, use the following formula:

(Number of Spam Complaints / Total Number of Emails Delivered) x 100

For instance, if you sent 1,000 emails, 800 were delivered, and 10 of those were marked as spam, your Complaint Rate would be 1.25%.

Monitoring Complaint Rate

The Complaint Rate serves as a critical indicator of how well your emails are received by your audience. The challenges posed by spam complaints emphasize the importance of crafting emails that genuinely resonate with recipients. A heightened Complaint Rate not only jeopardizes your immediate campaign but can also lead to broader deliverability issues. Addressing the underlying causes of these complaints promptly is paramount.

Always take proactive measures in reducing the Complaint Rate. Ensuring that your emails aren’t flagged by blocklists and pass essential checks can minimize the chances of them being marked as spam. By continuously monitoring this rate and making necessary adjustments based on feedback and analytics, you can maintain a positive sender reputation, ensuring your emails consistently reach their intended audience.

Spam Trap Rate

The Spam Trap Rate represents the percentage of your emails that land in spam traps set up by ISPs (Internet Service Providers). These traps are specific email addresses designed to catch spammers or marketers who don’t follow best email practices. They can be old, recycled email addresses or addresses that were never used by real users.

Landing in a spam trap is a significant red flag for ISPs. It indicates that the sender might be using poor list hygiene practices, such as not regularly cleaning their email list or using purchased lists. A high Spam Trap Rate can severely damage your sender reputation, leading to reduced deliverability rates or even blacklisting. It’s imperative to keep this rate as low as possible to ensure your emails reach their intended recipients.

How to Calculate Spam Trap Rate:

To determine your Spam Trap Rate, use the following formula:

(Number of Emails Caught in Spam Traps / Total Number of Emails Sent) x 100

For instance, if you sent 10,000 emails and 10 of those landed in spam traps, your Spam Trap Rate would be 0.1%.

Monitoring Spam Trap Rate

The direct monitoring of this rate is inherently tricky due to the covert nature of spam traps. Although there are some ways to discover spam traps, indirect indicators can be more revealing. Regular list hygiene practices, such as cleaning and updating your email list and avoiding purchased lists, are essential. Furthermore, a noticeable decline in engagement metrics might hint at emails getting ensnared in spam traps. Feedback loops provided by some ISPs, which inform senders when emails are marked as spam, can also serve as an indirect barometer, with a surge in complaints potentially signaling an increased encounter rate with spam traps.

Re-Engage or Remove? 5 Tips to Win Back Inactive Email List Subscribers

Email Deliverability Expert Advice for Hitting the Inbox

3 Tactics to Get More Subscribers and Build a Money-Making Email List

Crafting Killer Email CTAs That Demand Action (And Get It)

How to Setup SPF, DKIM and DMARC Records for Maximum Email Security

How DMARC Works: the Secrets to Email Security

What Is DKIM: A Simple Breakdown

Does Capitalization Matter in Emails? A Comprehensive Guide

Is DMARC Necessary? 5 Reasons You Should Implement DMARC Now!