What is Email Engagement and How Do You Track It?

The word "engagement" gets thrown around in the marketing community, and it's especially nebulous when applied to email marketing. On the surface, measuring email engagement is as straightforward as tracking engagement on channels like socials, where likes and comments are immediately evident. But what does email engagement actually look like, and what metrics should you track to make sure your engagement is healthy?

What does email engagement really mean?

The boring answer: email engagement is the number of interactions in your email. Depending on who you ask, this could be open rates, click-through rates, or the ratio between the two (referred to as click-through to open rate, or CTOR). But the more important answer is that email engagement is when you're willing to listen to your recipients. It's when you get off the metaphorical stage and actually talk to the crowd. One newsletter started including a "question of the week" using one-click survey emails, tracking how many people click on each button as a "vote." Using this strategy increased CTOR from a usual average of 3% to 9% for that campaign, with the last button leading to a survey tool that collected responses from readers, helping the team know what their audience wanted to learn about rather than guessing behind the scenes.

Email engagement metrics to track

If you work for an organization or need to keep clients happy, you're probably wondering how to justify these "conversations" with hard numbers. Before diving into which metrics to track, keep a few things in mind: understand your business model, since attention doesn't always mean success and the most important metrics are the ones that lead to an increase in revenue; know where your needs meet customer needs, considering what they need from you in order to successfully buy and use what you're selling; and test your own list before making conclusions, since every email list is different.

With that in mind, here are some metrics you can use to determine whether your campaign is working:

• Click-through rate. The percentage of people who clicked on at least one link in your email compared to how many people received the message.
• CTOR. Also known as the "click to open rate," this measures the percentage of clicks compared to the number of people who opened the email, which is different from click-through rate because it only considers people who actually opened the email.
• Response rate. Rather than using a "no-reply@..." sender, try sending emails from a "yes-reply@..." address, and invite your audience to share their thoughts or feedback on the message. This works especially well for newsletters, where recipients may want to respond to your ideas.

How to run a re-engagement campaign when your metrics are low

If you're starting a brand-new list, engagement might be the easy part. But when you're new to a company and inherit their existing list, or if you've neglected your own list for some time, it's often an uphill battle to get it back up and moving. What do you do when you're sending emails only to be faced with low opens and very few clicks? Summon the re-engagement campaign, which has two main goals: figure out who still wants to be on your list, and understand how to make your content better.

While there are many strategies for re-engagement, the first step is to talk to your target audience: sit in on client calls, join relevant online communities, participate in webinars, and read comments to understand what your ideal customer wants to see in their content. Then, don't be afraid to take chances and change up what you're doing. One simple tactic to understand an audience: including a thumbs up or thumbs down in every email, where a thumbs up means "this email is helpful to me" and a thumbs down means "this email could be better." Based on results like these, you can create content that meets audience needs, and increase engagement in the process.