Several statistics tell you that email enjoys a better ROI than any other social networking sites.
So, do we consider the work as done after having sent out our email campaigns? Certainly not. We need the result, don’t we? We need to know how far the marketing was effective!
So, what should be the next step? Well, it is the evaluation. But wondering how to go about it? Well, there are a few strategies that you could follow. But to make use of the following strategies, you should have access to any of the analytical tools available in the market. Or if you are not in the mood to shed some dollars, then you could make use of the Google Analytics. It can be accessed for free of cost. So start by signing up for Google Analytics to evaluate the traffic at your site.
So learn to use these following strategies to evaluate the success of your email marketing campaigns.
- Delivery rate:
Delivery rate is the basis of any email marketing evaluation. It refers to the percentage of emails that reach your subscribers’ inbox instead of getting bounced back. Emails can get undelivered because of various reasons, such as the presence of an invalid email address or a faulty server. When an email fails to get delivered, it can only mean one thing in marketing: the probable loss of a potential customer. Hence, it is important to keep a track of the delivery rate as emails are one of the major links to our customers.
Formula: total no. of undelivered emails total no. of emails sent
- Open rate:
Open rate is the percentage of the email recipients who had opened our emails. Understanding the open rate is crucial because the success of our Email marketing campaigns commences with the mail getting opened and read. Open rate will also let us understand how occupied our subscriber base is with our email marketing campaigns.
Formula: total no. of emails opened emails delivered
- Click-through rate:
Click-through rate is important for its proximity to the ultimate goal of an email marketing campaign. Any email marketing campaign will have an agenda, that is, to convert the subscribers into customers. The click-through rate basically speaks of the interest that the subscribers are showing in your brand/products. It this interest that pave a way to your business.
Formula: total no. of clickthroughs total no. of emails delivered
- Conversion rate:
The conversion rate is the percentage of the recipients who had fulfilled the purpose of the email. It is not that all those who had opened and had clicked through our emails will end up buying that product we wanted them to buy. But if they do, it is time to celebrate. The conversion rate tells us about the success rate. The question is, however, whether the percentage is desirable or not.
Formula: total no. of conversions total no. of emails delivered
- Declining rate (Unsubscribe rate/Scam rate)
Declining rate refers to the ‘unsubcribes’ and ‘scams’ your email receives. It refers to the percentage of recipients who had either unsubscribed from our emails or moved them to the scam. This rate is important to understand the nature of our email campaigns and also how well those emails are being received. Unlike the first four, this percentage should be lesser.
Formula: total no. of unsubscribes total no. of emails delivered
Or
total no. of scams total no of emails delivered
These strategies and formulae analyze our email marketing campaigns. They help us in keeping an eye on places where we are doing good and where we are lacking. Such an understanding of our email campaigns will let us know where we stand, and will, in turn, direct our thoughts to the several ways through which we could improve our sales rate.