Here at EcoSend, we have a lot of discussions as a team about how we can help our customers win at email marketing. ✉️ 💰

A recent topic mentioned by Chris (our Customer Success Lead) was the concept of how to actually measure the success of your email campaigns.

That's because for such a long time, the email industry has clung to a rigid set of success metrics which aren't always as helpful as they may seem.

After all, do the likes of users subscribing or even opening your email contribute towards your email ROI in tangible terms?

Chris made a really insightful point based on his experience working with our customers that actually, there are a lot of false positives within email metrics. 

So instead, we want you to reframe how you measure the success of your campaigns in 2023 and beyond.

All of which is designed to actually help you boost ROI, seen as there’s one measure of email success that couldn’t be clearer for your business.

First Up - The Email Metrics That Aren’t The Measure Of Success They Seem

Don’t panic. Many of the following common email metrics aren’t going away, and they still play an important role.

But the major thing we want you to consider is that on their own, these metrics only tell part of the story. 

In reality, all of the following common metrics are smaller steps to get you to the overall goal. 

But they in themselves cannot achieve the goal for you, which may be more sales or simply better customer engagement. 

Subject Lines

It’s somehow ironic how a subject line contains the least amount of copy within an email, yet it’s the thing we worry most about as email marketers.

Don’t get us wrong, your subject lines are important, and you should definitely put effort into them. But in terms of being the definition of whether you’re successful or not, subject lines can certainly help but they also can’t do it all alone. 

Really, the aim of a subject line is to keep your email out of the spam box by avoiding the hundreds of spam trigger words that exist.

Also, to pique the interest of your subscribers, bearing in mind they may receive hundreds of emails a week. 

But if users click your email and aren't impressed enough to follow a link to your website and make a purchase, that campaign didn't reach its potential. Even with the best subject line in tow.

So in terms of measuring the success of your emails - the subject line forms the basic foundations of success but not the whole story.

Open Rates

Having someone open your email is an achievement, especially since average open rates across all industries sit at 33% as of 2023 - (ConstantContact).

The only trouble is having someone open your email does not equal an instant sale or even a connection with what you’re trying to say.

Unless someone goes on to complete the intended action of that email, all that person did was…open that email. 

Think of this similar to a celebrity having 5 million Instagram followers, but only 100 people which go onto purchase a product they are promoting on a post. Sometimes there's more to the initial numbers that meets the eye in terms of the returns you'll see.

Although, one positive caveat here is that with any kind email marketing at least your brand is communicating. Your campaigns will build awareness which could land you a sale at a later date.

But for right now, simply opening an email in itself is akin to grabbing a plate at a buffet but not actually putting any food on that plate. 

No Increase In The Unsubscribe Rate 

When you don’t lose subscribers after sending out an email marketing campaign it can feel like a huge pat on the back. But it really depends on whether these remaining subscribers are actively engaged or not.

After all, if you send a campaign out to 10,000 people, but 6,000 of those contacts are made up of old email addresses, or simply users which never open your emails - what you have on your hands is a dirty email list. 

If an email list isn’t clean, it isn’t effective. So what ends up happening is you pay to send out campaigns to people who will never read, let alone interact with your emails.

But if you have mostly engaged subscribers and a low unsubscribe rate, that's the dream!

Top tip 💡: You can send re-engagement campaigns to keep your email list healthy and clean with EcoSend. 

So How Do I Know If My Email Campaigns Are Working?

It’s actually really simple: track actual user activity.

If you use any email marketing software (such as EcoSend), you should have a dashboard that gives you a rundown of the types of actions your campaigns generated.

So for instance, did an abandoned cart-triggered email actually win back that customer? Did someone upgrade their existing SaaS subscription after you highlighted the value of your product to them via email?

You may even be able to correlate an increase in sales based on the types of email campaigns sent, which can’t be attributed to other forms of marketing you may do. 

Essentially, you need to study the data and look at the direct actions your email campaigns did or did not generate as a result.

At the end of the day, this is what matters with email marketing.

Yes, email campaigns can look pretty, and when they are done well they can even get people onto your website.

But at the end of the day, the true measure of email success is when campaigns perform and ultimately get the job done. 

EcoSend - Start Your Free Trial Of Our Sustainable Email Marketing Tool Today

Did you know you can send incredible email campaigns (not to mention measure their success!) without impacting the planet?

EcoSend is the world’s first sustainable email marketing platform. Our systems run on renewable energy, and we’ll plant trees on your behalf just for using us. 

Best of all, you don’t have to compromise on any of the features you need for your campaigns just for being greener.

If you’re a business or email marketer reading this, we’d like to get you started with a free trial of EcoSend! 

Join today and we’ll plant a tree just for checking us out. If you’d like to chat with us further, please contact our support team.