As an eCommerce business, you need to make sure that your transactional and marketing emails actually reach the inboxes of your customers. This is where email deliverability comes in.
Email deliverability is a measure of how often your emails are successfully delivered to subscribers' inboxes. A high delivery rate means that most of your emails are getting through, while a low delivery rate means that many of your emails are getting blocked or sent to spam.
In this blog, we'll take a closer look at what delivery rate is, how it's measured, and what you can do to improve your own email deliverability.
What is email delivery rate?
Your email delivery rate is the percentage of emails that are successfully delivered to subscribers' inboxes. This number can be affected by a number of factors, including:
- The quality of your email list (Are you sending to valid, active email addresses?)
- The content of your emails (Are you sending spammy or promotional content?)
- Your sender reputation (Have you been flagged for spam in the past?)
- The configuration of your email server (Are you using proper authentication?)
Your email delivery rate is important because it directly impacts the number of people who will see your emails. If your delivery rate is low, then fewer people will receive your emails. This can lead to lower open and click-through rates, and ultimately, less revenue for your business.
What's a good email delivery rate?
There is no hard and fast rule for what constitutes a "good" email delivery rate, as this number can vary depending on your industry, your email list, and a number of other factors.
Within eCommerce, a delivery rate of over 80% is considered fairly good. However, the best way to gauge your own email deliverability is to compare your rate to your industry average. You can do this by looking at your delivery rate over time and seeing how it compares to the average delivery rate for your industry. Look at your competitors, too, and see how their rates compare to yours.
If your email delivery rate is significantly lower than the average for your industry, then you may have a problem with your email list, your sender reputation, or the way you're sending emails. In this case, you'll need to take some steps to improve your delivery rate.
How is email delivery rate measured?
To understand, calculate, and improve your email delivery rate, you need to track a few key metrics:
- Bounce rate: This is the percentage of emails that could not be delivered. There are two types of bounces: hard bounces and soft bounces. Hard bounces occur when an email address is invalid or doesn't exist. Soft bounces occur when an email address is valid but the mailbox is full, the message is too large, or the server is temporarily unavailable.
- Block rate: This is the percentage of emails that were blocked by spam filters.
- Spam complaint rate: This is the percentage of people who mark your email as spam.
- Delivery rate: This is the percentage of emails that were successfully delivered to inboxes.
To calculate your email delivery rate, simply take the number of emails that were delivered and divide it by the number of emails that were sent. For example, if you sent 100 emails and only 80 of them reached the inbox, then your email delivery rate would be 80%.
Knowing this information using email marketing automation is important, but it's only half the battle. The other half is understanding how to improve your email delivery rate.
How to improve your email delivery rate
There are a few key things you can do to improve your email delivery rate:
1. Keep your list clean
One of the best ways to improve your email delivery rate is to keep your list clean. This means removing invalid and inactive email addresses on a regular basis. You can do this manually or with an email validation service like Kickbox.
2. Send relevant, targeted emails
Another way to improve your email delivery rate is to send relevant, targeted emails to your subscribers. This means segmenting your list and sending each segment tailored content that is relevant to their interests.
3. Monitor your sender reputation
Your sender reputation is one of the most important factors in email deliverability. Make sure to monitor your sender reputation regularly and take steps to improve it if necessary. You can do this by using a service like SenderScore.
4. Configure your email server properly
Email servers need to be configured correctly in order to ensure optimal email deliverability. Make sure to work with a qualified IT professional to configure your server properly.
5. Use an email delivery service
If you're having trouble getting your emails delivered, you may want to consider using an email delivery service like SendGrid or Mailgun. These services will help to ensure that your emails are delivered to the inbox.
6. Monitor your analytics
Monitoring your email delivery rate is important, but it's also important to monitor your overall email analytics. This includes things like open rate, click-through rate, and unsubscribe rate. These metrics will give you a good idea of how your emails are performing and whether or not they're being delivered to the inbox.
Email deliverability is a complex topic, but by understanding the basics, you can take steps to improve your email delivery rate. By following the tips above, you can ensure that more of your subscribers see your emails and that your business is able to achieve its goals.
Email delivery rate: the bottom line
A higher delivery rate means more people will receive your emails, which can lead to higher open and click-through rates, and ultimately, more revenue for your business. Be on the lookout for email marketing solutions that include features like automatic list cleaning and real-time sender reputation monitoring to help keep your delivery rate high.
AfterShip Marketing, for example, offers a suite of email marketing automation tools that can help you improve your delivery rate. In fact, customers have seen delivery rates of up to 99% with AfterShip.
And that means more people will see your emails, more people will engage with your content, and more people will buy from you.
