The death of vanity metrics

Why vanity metrics like Open & Click rates are not longer valid

In the fast-evolving world of digital marketing, the metrics we use to gauge success are crucial. For many years, open rates and click-through rates (CTR) were the go-to indicators for email marketing success. However, recent changes by major email service providers, including Google and Apple, challenge the validity of these vanity metrics. Here’s a breakdown of why relying on open and click rates can lead to misleading conclusions and how marketers can adapt.

1. Changes in Tracking Mechanisms

Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection, introduced in 2021, altered the way email open rates are tracked. Now, when a user receives an email on an Apple device, their email client can pre-load images, giving the illusion that the email was opened even if the user never engaged with it. This shift means that traditional open rates no longer accurately reflect audience engagement. Google has also made strides in enhancing user privacy, further complicating the reliability of these metrics.

2. The Impact of Privacy Initiatives

With growing public concern over privacy and data protection, email service providers are prioritizing user privacy over traditional tracking methods. This includes not just Apple, but also initiatives from Google, Yahoo and other players in the market. As privacy measures tighten, marketers can no longer rely on open rates as a true reflection of engagement. With some providers blocking the reporting, or others automatically downloading images on delivery (which can be seen as a “read” email). Instead, focusing on consent-based or more connected experience based metrics will offer a clearer view of audience interactions.

3. The Misleading Nature of Click Rates

While click rates may still hold some relevance, they too can be misleading. Changes to email designs, such as incorporating more buttons instead of text links, can skew click data. Additionally, automated click-throughs from bots can inflate these numbers, leading marketers to overestimate engagement. It's essential to evaluate the quality of clicks, not just their quantity, and assess whether those clicks lead to meaningful actions or conversions. For example if every single recipient of your email both opened and clicked, but all excited your site immediately, what is the value of that 100% click and open metric?  But a 5% conversion to sale rate on that same email would hold not just more valuable ROI data, but improved personalisation data to drive a better customer experience.

4. Rethinking Engagement Metrics

With the reevaluation of traditional metrics, marketers need to pivot toward more meaningful engagement indicators. Consider tracking:

• Conversion Rates: Focus on how many readers take the desired action after engaging with your email. For some that may even be deciding what the desired action of your campaigns is, and if you can track it.

• List Growth and Health: Monitor subscriber growth, retention rates, and list cleanliness to gauge overall audience interest.

• Customer Feedback: Engage subscribers through surveys or feedback forms to gain insights into their preferences and experiences.

• Revenue Metrics: Ultimately, the goal is to drive sales (or a clear action). Metrics like average order value and revenue per email sent can give a clearer picture of success.

5. Emphasising Content Quality and User Experience

As we move away from vanity metrics, the importance of quality content and user experience becomes paramount. Creating compelling, relevant, and personalized content will naturally encourage engagement, leading to better conversion rates. Focus on delivering value to your subscribers rather than chasing artificial performance indicators.

6. The connected tech stack

The connected tech stack is the only sure fire way to provide those amazing experiences for customers, while being able to track successful outcomes of each email campaign, text message or website visit to name a few. Consider the below*:

• A customer relationship management (CRM) system, like Salesforce Sales Cloud, connected to your marketing automation tool.  Allowing key customer segments that align with your desired outcome to be created using sales and PII Data

• A marketing automation tool, like Salesforce Marketing Cloud, connected to your website (with Einstein Personalisation).  Rather than an “open” or “click through” rate in the email tool, we can see people landing on the site, directly from an email or sms, and then track what they do next.  Rather than assuming what they did from the email click, next time they arrive on site, or in future emails, we can use what they actually viewed on the website to tailor their next personalised content.

• A website connected to your commerce platform, like Salesforce commerce cloud.  After seeing a customer land on your website from an email, we can now track them to a product page, and see them purchase that product through the commerce software.

• A commerce platform connected to your CRM.  We have come full circle, we can now ditch vanity metrics and replace them with clear results based metrics that align to business KPIs and platform ROI. We can also continue on this cycle, further personalising and segmenting to improve customer experience and driving improved company outcomes like increased basket size or faster repurchase times.

• Service cloud for any issues along the way.  If there is any issue through this journey, a connected service cloud instance where call centre reps can see each step, each transaction and each email only enhances the customer experience.  Enabling support staff to act quickly with accurate information to solve the customers problem.

A simplified view of a connected customer technology stack

This circular motion not only drives huge value for the company, but shows customers you as a business understand them, and can communicate with them on a personal level.  This process will drive higher engagement rates and customer satisfaction scores.

* This example is given as a connected customer journey example, not necessarily from an architectural best practice example, hence why Data Cloud is also shown as the centre of this customer 360.

Conclusion

As the digital landscape continues to shift towards greater privacy and user security, marketers must adapt by moving away from vanity metrics like open and click rates. By embracing more meaningful engagement / results metrics, understanding your audience, and prioritizing quality content, marketers will be better positioned to navigate the evolving email and customer communication landscape to achieve their business goals.

In a world where data privacy is paramount, it's time to redefine what success looks like in email marketing—focusing not on vanity, but on value and accountability.

This will predominantly come down to well architected technology stacks and companies that have the capability to utilise these technology stacks for themselves #sustaintablestacks