# Measuring your email marketing metrics will make you a better fundraiser

- Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2020/01/29/measuring-your-email-marketing-metrics-will-make-you-a-better-fundraiser/
- Published: 2020-01-29T15:16:50+00:00
- Author: Howard Lake

**One of the best things about email marketing is that it can be so easily tracked,
measured and reported on. In the world of fundraising where there are very few guarantees,
it’s one area where you can know exactly what’s going on. What do your supporters
love? What do they not like quite as much? What really drives clicks and what falls
flat?**

With simple and easy tracking, you have insight into these questions and so much
more, so you’ll know exactly where the conversions have happened, identify areas
for improvement and ultimately, deliver more effective fundraising campaigns.

 

## Advertisement

 [⌊Posthub advert. You create the campaign. We'll handle the postal journey. Get started at post-hub.co.uk.⌉](https://fundraising.co.uk/ads/posthub-20261007-300x250/)

The key metrics every fundraiser should measure are:

### Send volume

The total count of recipients (email addresses) that were sent the email message.
This is the final count after all recency and suppressions have been applied. 

 

### Bounce number

This is the number of email addresses that bounced back from the Email Service Providers(
ESPs) such as Gmail, Outlook, Yahoo etc. There are two types of bounce:

**Hard bounce number** – A permanent bounce when the email address is invalid. An
email address may be invalid if it does not exist. Hard bounces should be set to
a do not email setting on the first bounce occurrence.

 

**Soft bounce number** – A temporary bounce usually due to a full inbox of ISP deferring.
Attempt to send to these emails 2-3 times before moving to a ‘do not email’ setting.

 

You can calculate bounce rate as a percentage use this calculation:

![Bounce rate equation](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2020/01/1-bounce-rate-
copy.png)

_Bounce rate equation_

 

### Delivered number and percentage

The total number of emails successfully delivered to the inbox.

Send Volume – Total Bounces = Number of emails delivered

As a percentage, delivery rate should be around 95% or higher. To calculate as a
percentage:

 

![Delivery rate equation](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2020/01/2-delivery-
rate-copy.png)

_Delivery rate equation_

 

### Open rate

The open rate is the percentage of recipients that have opened your email compared
to how many contacts were sent the email.

 

The open rate can be split into **total opens** (the total number of opens for the
email e.g. an email address may open the email three times which equals three opens)
and **unique opens** (the number of unique opens for the email e.g. if an individual
email address opens the email three times, that equals one unique open).

 

The percentage of total opens is calculated by:

![Total open rate calculation](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2020/01/3-total-
open-rate-copy.png)

_Total open rate calculation_

 

The percentage of unique opens is calculated by:

![Unique open rate calculation](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2020/01/4-unique-
open-rate-copy.png)

_Unique open rate calculation_

 

On average for the sector, open rates should be **around 25%**.

 

An open is recorded or tracked by an invisible 1×1 GIF in the email HTML creative
when the recipient downloads images. The GIF is added automatically by your ESP.
Tracking the open rate is really handy if you are split testing subject lines as
it gives you the metrics you need to understand which version performed best. It’s
also a good metric to track over time to measure success; if the open rate increases
over time, subscribers are enjoying the content you are sharing, so keep up the 
good work!

 

### Click through rate (CTR)

Click through rate is the percentage of recipients that have clicked on any link
in your email.

Clicks are tracked in your ESP via tracking code appended to the end of links. Click
through rate is calculated using this formula:

![Click through rate formula](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2020/01/5-Click-
through-rate-copy.png)

_Click through rate formula_

 

### Click to open rate (CTOR / CTO)

CTO rate tells you out of the subscribers that opened the email, how many of them
clicked. It is an important metric to use when considering content relevancy – if
the CTO rate is higher, the content in the email is relevant to the people opening
and they respond by clicking through. Open rates can vary so CTO is a useful measurement
of content and creative to compare across campaigns.

![Click to open rate formula](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2020/01/6-Click-
to-open-rate-copy.png)

_Click to open rate formula_

 

### Conversion rate

Conversion rate is the percentage of email recipients that clicked on a link in 
your email and then went on to complete a desired action. For example, if a recipient
clicked on a ‘Donate Now’ call to action (CTA) in your email and then made a donation
on your website, they have completed the desired action. They have converted from
your email.

 

When calculating conversion rate, it is important to define your end goal e.g. is
it a donation on site or a content download? Then you need to decide whether to 
base your conversion rate on all sent emails, the number of emails opened, or should
you only consider emails clicks e.g. from the number of clicks in email, how many
went on to convert. Once you have these defined you can use this calculation:

![Conversion rate formula](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2020/01/7-conversion-
rate-copy.png)

_How to calculate conversion rate_

 

If using the send volume in this calculation, expect the conversion rate to be low.

 

### Income per email

Calculating income should be a high priority. It is important to know the overall
return on investment for each email you’re sending, otherwise you’ve no idea whether
your efforts are ultimately worthwhile for the charity (and your sanity). 

![Calculation for income from email](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2020/01/
8-income-from-email-copy.png)

_How to calculate income from email_

 

### Unsubscribe rate

The unsubscribe rate is the percentage of recipients that unsubscribe from your 
email. This includes recipients that click on your unsubscribe link in the email
and those that unsubscribe via the list unsubscribe option in the inbox.

![Calculating the unsubscribe rate](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2020/01/
9-unsub-rate-copy.png)

_How to calculate the unsubscribe rate_

 

Your unsubscribe rate should always be **less than 1%**.

 

Hungry for more? While the metrics mentioned above are the most widely used, there
are some additional you might want to consider:

 * List growth rate
 * Spam complaint rate

 

### List growth rate

This is how to measure the rate of your email list growth over time.

 

![How to calculate your list growth rate](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2020/
01/10-list-growth-rate-copy.png)

_Formula to calculate your list growth rate_

 

It is important to keep track of list size and any growth or loss of subscribers.
The goal should always be to increase your list size but there will always be some
natural list decay. It’s important to keep an eye on this and to measure it make
sure your list size remains healthy.

 

### Spam complaint rate

Spam complaint rate is the percentage of recipients that click the spam or junk 
button in their inbox. Spam complaints are recorded via feedback loops provided 
by the ISPs.

 

![Calculating your spam complaint rate](https://wfay6x.infiniteuploads.cloud/2020/
01/11-spam-complaint-copy.png)

_How to calculate your email spam complaint rate_

 

Your spam complaint rate should always be **less than 0.1%**.

 

### Reporting

Taking these measurements and putting them into a report is the first step to effectively
measuring email marketing performance. Measure and report on each email and then
track results over time to get a clear picture of effectiveness.

 

_**Jordan Sawyer** is Senior Account Manager at email specialist [Kickdynamic](https://www.kickdynamic.com/)._

![Loading](https://fundraising.co.uk/wp-content/plugins/page-views-count/ajax-loader-
2x.gif)