How to Achieve an Average Email Open Rate of 2023 – Tips & Best Practices

Reaching an average email open rate of 2023 can seem like an unattainable goal for many, but with the right tips and best practices, it’s certainly within reach. This article provides a comprehensive guide to achieving an impressive email open rate while examining key topics such as content optimization, building relationships with subscribers, and using personalization tactics.

From selecting the right subject line, to creating effective segmentation strategies and testing frequency, this in-depth article offers actionable advice and useful tips on how to obtain and exceed that coveted 2023 open rate.

What is Email Open Rate?

The success of email marketing campaigns and the effectiveness of subject lines can be accessed by examining email open rates. According to a recent study, 4 billion people around the world use email, with 61% of people enjoying promotional emails arriving in their inbox. Email open rate (or open rate) measures the number of times an email is actually opened after sending out a mailing campaign. For email marketers, understanding how well your email marketing strategy performs is essential, and this includes measuring email metrics such as open rate and click to open rate (CTR). The email open rate can be expressed as a percentage or ratio. To calculate it, take the number of emails opened from a total amount sent and divide that number by the total amount of emails sent, expressed as a percentage. This metric provides email marketers with valuable insight into how successful their email strategy is and what further actions should be taken for improvement. Open rates give marketers important information about a campaign’s performance and how it fits within one’s own internal metrics regarding the bounce rates, open rates and the overall effectiveness of their email marketing efforts.

Many factors affect email open rates and can result in higher or lower numbers than expected. Factors such as content relevancy, send time, frequency and email list quality all have a critical impact on email open rates. Emails should be relevant to readers in order to build trust and to increase open rates. Likewise, research shows that optimal send-time can influence open rates; if an email is sent too early or too late, the open rate could suffer. Additionally, sending too many emails will result in an overkill and can negatively impact open rates. Finally, the quality of email lists plays an important role in email open rates; poor quality email lists often have low open rates.

Making efforts to improve and optimize email open rates are highly recommended to achieve better performance. Email marketers should focus on creating interesting content, and personalizing subject lines; increasing urgency with announcements, taking advantage of humor and using shocking phrases to make subscribers curious. Furthermore, using first names in subject lines, incorporating emojis, and watching out for spam filters can help boost open rate. Last but not least, email marketers should always proofread emails before sending, resend unopened emails, A/B test different aspects and take feedback of unsubscribers into account.

In conclusion, improving open rates is an integral part of digital marketing success. Taking into account the numerous variables affecting open rate performance plays a crucial role in effectively managing email campaigns in order to maximize return on investment. Being aware of your subscriber’s interests, being mindful of send time and email frequency, and utilizing powerful subject lines strategies can definitely help you stay ahead in the game.

Why Does Open Rate Matter?

Open rates are an essential metric for measuring success with any email marketing campaigns. They reveal how successful your subject lines, content and promotions are at engaging customers. The higher the open rate, the more effective your emails become in terms of customer engagement, ROI, and content performance. The average email open rate across all industries, as reported by Constant Contact in March 2021, is 20.23%. There are industry-specific figures too: the healthcare industry had an average open rate of 18.9%, while the software industry enjoyed a 33.8% average open rate.

Open rates may be influenced by different variables such as content relevancy, send time, frequency and email list quality. Click-through rates (CTR) and click-to-open rates (CTOR) offer granular information on individual list segments. CTR reflects the interest in a specific link while CTOR reveals whether or not a particular email was opened.

Best practices to improve open rates include personalization, segmentation, and short subject lines. Emojis within subject lines can help to make them stand out in subscribers’ inboxes and it’s important to stay away from spam filters. Another way to increase open rates is to use the recipient’s first name in the subject line, making it feel more personal. Getting feedback from unsubscribers helps to segment content appropriately and refine future campaigns.

A/B testing is also important as it allows comparison of different visuals, content, or subject lines while providing insights into customer preferences. Before sending out promotional emails, it’s important to proofread them to avoid minor grammar or spelling mistakes which may lead to sloppy emails.

In conclusion, open rate matters when it comes to email campaigns. It provides deeper insight into customer engagement levels and helps marketers to plan future strategies in a smarter way. By utilizing the right practices discussed in this article, marketers can find ways to increase open rates that suit their audience and overall business goals.

Average Email Open Rates by Industry

Email open rates are an important metric in email marketing campaigns, as they measure how many of the emails sent were opened and interacted with by the recipient. Open rates in email marketing metrics are calculated by taking the number of emails that were opened divided by the total number of emails sent and expressed as a percentage. A high email open rate not only signifies that recipients show interest in the content of the message but that there is also a certain return on investment from the emails being sent to them.

Average email open rates vary according to industry, with some industries getting higher open rates than others. For instance, the real estate industry typically sees the highest average open rates at 26.3%, while restaurants average 19.53% and religious organizations feature average open rates of 13%. The restaurant industry may have low open rates due its large volume of emails sent out for various promotions, while the high open rates in the real estate industry can be attributed to personalization and dedicated subject lines each time an email is sent out by a broker or agency. Generally, blogs and e-commerce emails tend to see significantly higher open rates than most other industries, as they often produce content which people seek out.

Content relevancy, send time, frequency, and list quality all affect the open rate of emails, with content relevancy being one of the most important factors when an email benchmarks it comes to increasing open rates. Having personalized subject lines which make the recipient curious will drive higher open rates, as well as using humorous subject lines or shocking subject lines to grab attention. It is also important to avoid using overly long subject lines and to keep in mind the target audience when constructing them. Furthermore, optimizing emails for mobile devices is imperative since a huge majority of emails are now being read on those devices.

Here you can learn about differences between Click Rate and Click Through Rate!

In order to increase open rates, email marketers should use effective strategies such as using the recipient’s first name in the subject line, including emojis in subject lines to enhance engagement, and proofreading emails to ensure accuracy before sending. Delivery times should also be optimized according to the preferences of subscribers and could vastly improve average click through rate, rates and ultimately open rates. Lastly, marketers should conduct A/B testing to receive feedback from subscribers and resend unopened emails with different subject lines.

From industry averages of healthcare services through to benchmarks in email marketing, different industries experience vastly different open rates and metrics. Knowing the specific industry averages and metrics helps inform email marketers about what to expect from their own campaigns and how to improve future emails in order to maximize open rate. Ultimately, sticking to these core principles can help ensure that each email marketing campaign achieves an industry average of email open rate of 2023 or above.

Factors Affecting Open Rate

Open rates are essential for gauging the success of any email marketing campaign. These metrics provide valuable insight into how users interact with your emails. They reflect how well an email message is performing, its effectiveness and compatibility with the target audience. It is essential to understand what factors influence this metric in your email marketing benchmarks in order to strengthen and optimize your email campaigns and make them more appealing to your potential customers.

There are four main factors that can have an effect on email open rate – content relevancy, send time, frequency, and email list quality.

Content Relevancy

Content relevancy is one of the most important aspects when it comes to boosting open rates. This is because it reflects how interesting, engaging and helpful the content within the email is and whether it is suitable for the recipient’s interests. The better the content matches recipients interests, the higher the chances are that people will open the email.

With the use of market automation tools, you can tailor emails and social services according to each individual subsriber’s needs, likes and preferences. Through personalization and data-driven insights, you can tailor-make emails for every segment of your target audience, thereby improving click through rates and increasing your average open rate.

Send Time

The success of your email marketing campaign also depends on how appropriate the timing is. Statistics show that Mondays generally have good open rates and Tuesdays through Thursdays are often the best days to send emails. However, the optimal time of day to send emails closely depends on the target audience. For instance, certain industries may benefit from sending emails during the morning while others tend to do better when they sent emails in the afternoon or evening.

Keeping this in mind, it is essential to consider the time of day or commute times when crafting an email marketing campaign as it could help boost open rates significantly. Additionally, it is also beneficial to experiment with different send schedules and A/B testing to confirm the right time when you should be sending emails.

Frequency

It is important to keep in mind the ideal frequency when it comes to sending emails. Generally speaking, sending too many emails might irritate and frustrate email recipients, leading to the unsubscribers or worse, marked as “spam”; on the other hand, sending too few emails could lead to the subscribers forget about you.

Ideally, one should look for an email frequency that suits the target audience’s needs and does not overwhelm them. An efficient email scheduling tool would certainly come in handy in this regard as it can provide valuable analytics regarding open rates and click-through rate which immensely assists in determining the appropriate frequency.

It is likewise important to bear in mind the significance of segmentation when crafting an email campaign. This makes sure that only relevant content is sent to targeted groups so they stay engaged with your email and respond to it positively.

Email List Quality

It doesn’t matter the size of your email list, what truly matters is the quality of the list. Although a high number of subscribers is indicative of potential reach, quality is more important. To maintain good deliverability, having a compliant list is essential. To ensure this compliance, keeping the list up-to-date and robust is a must. You should regularly cleanse your list of any non-active users, old or outdated addresses, typos and errors.

It is worth noting that hard bounced emails are typically gone for good and the bounce rate should be monitored closely. In addition, leveraging age, gender and other interests associated with the subscriber base can be beneficial when creating customized subject lines. This helps create a connection with the reader and increases the odds of getting the emails opened.

Best Practices to Improve Your Open Rate

Time spent creating quality emails is never wasted. Improving email open rates is one of the most important tasks faced by email marketers, as these metrics indicate the level of engagement with subscribers and the success of an email marketing campaign. Knowing how to create compelling subject lines that entice readers to click is key to boosting open rates. To achieve an average open rate of 20%, best practices must be followed, such as ones that make recipients curious, personalized subject lines, humorous subject lines, announcement subject lines, and shocking subject lines.

It’s important to understand the influence content relevancy can have on email open rates. According to research from IBM, a relevant email will reach 80% higher engagement compared to a generic email. This can be achieved by personalizing emails with recipient’s first name, which boosts ROI and average open rates by up to 26%. Other elements to consider when crafting a good subject line include relevance, length, and tone – the latter of which should be adapted to suit the target audience.

Another great tip for capturing attention in subject lines is using emojis – these little symbols can help convey emotion more quickly and effectively than words alone. Furthermore, they can give movements to an otherwise boring text, making it eye-catching on mobile devices and help increase click through rates. It’s vital, however, to avoid generic terms like ‘Newsletter’ or ‘Update’ in subject lines as these are likely to be turned off by the readers. Curiosity-inducing subject lines can also be effective. Crafting subject lines that subtly prompt the reader to want to know what lies inside the email without giving too much away is one way to generate interest that could eventually result in an increase in open rates. Providing specific details from a subscriber’s profile to a subject line can also come in handy for piquing interest about the content in the email — for instance, adding geographical location, purchase history, job titles, etc.

Humorous subject lines can be another way to engage readers and provoke an urge to find out what’s inside the emails. Humor can not only amuse but also show potential customers that you understand their needs, experiences and feelings. Therefore, utilizing humor in emails can result in higher open rates, as long as it is still related to the core topic. Additionally, announcement subject lines can be used to create hype and excitement among subscribers while informing them of new products or services. Shocking subject lines can be used to grab attention and draw more readers in, using phrases like “Is this really happening to you?” or something unexpected like calling out movie, song, or book titles.

Ultimately, it is important to always test and optimize emails before sending them out. By A/B testing different subject lines, email marketers can find the right combination of factors that work best with their target audience and improve open rates. While following all the tips and best practices outlined in this article could very well result in an improved open rate, the proof is in the pudding — careful testing must be done in order to see real results.

Ones that Make Recipient Curious

Subject lines should be crafted carefully in order to capture reader’s attention and maximize open rates. They need to be interesting and relevant to the reader. As general knowledge suggests, individuals are more likely to open an email if the subject line reflects their interests and needs. In addition to conveying value to the reader, subject lines should be short enough to fit into the preview window of an email inbox.

Including emojis can add life and color to an otherwise plain subject line. Some studies conclude that using emojis has the potential to increase click through rates by 7-12%. However, email marketers must pay attention to the limitations imposed by different email clients. Social symbols, signs, and marks might not render properly across various devices and applications.

Offering content upgrades, such as exclusive contents, downloadable ebooks, podcasts, webinars, and templates, may also entice prospects towards signing up for emails. One successful approach is to start by providing free content, such as blog posts, with valuable information and gradually move forward by leading recurrent subscribers towards landing pages offering content upgrades.

At the end of the day, providing value helps build relationships with subscribers and keeps them engaged. Aiming to solve their problems and helping them reach their goals should always be the ultimate goal of any campaign monitor any marketing campaign – email marketing campaigns included.

Personalized Subject Lines

Personalized subject lines can make a huge difference in email open rates. Personalizing emails with the recipient’s first name can lead to an increase of up to 26% in click through rates and open rates. Merge tags can be implemented to insert the recipient’s name directly into the email. Doing so creates the feeling within the customer that the email was sent directly to them.

Along with personalization, the brevity of a subject line is important. Subject lines shouldn’t be longer than 70 characters, as numerous mailboxes won’t even show past this amount. Aim for short and snappy subject lines to ensure your emails don’t get lost. Additionally, studies indicate that including 1-3 emoji in an email subject line can boost open rates by 56%. Emoji can supplement words and create unique subject lines to meet the needs of the target audience.

When working with prospects, try to call attention to deals they might be interested in with hooks. For instance, phrases like “Time-Buy – [X]-amount% OFF!” can induce the reader to click on the email in search of a bargain, therefore increasing open rates. Another powerful way to attract more readers is to offer valuable content upgrades, such as premium articles and templates. Content upgrades are useful to provide education, entertainment and solve the problems of users.

Finally, as mentioned before, providing value to prospects and customers is key to maintaining current readership and increasing open rates. Solve people’s problems and help them reach their goals to build relationships and keep readers engaged with emails.

Humorous Subject Lines

Humor can be a great way to get the attention of readers and to increase open rates. Studies suggest that since people are inundated with emails every day, humor can break the monotony and help captivate the recipient’s attention. Humorous subject lines must be approached objectively and analytically, as inappropriate jokes rarely succeed in making a good impression.

Creating a fun and light tone in subject lines can be relatively easier than it appears. References to popular culture, trends and literature can deliver humor without taking away seriousness. Interestingly, reports indicate that evidence-based humor (like puns) produces more impact than merely tongue-in-cheek jokes. Emoji can also assist by adding graphic features and interjecting gaps between different sentences.

The successfulness of a humorous subject line also comes down to length. The messaging should be kept short and snappy, so as not to confuse the readers. Adding the recipient’s first name can also help further encourage the intended impact. Finally, when injecting humor into subject lines, it must be done carefully and deliberately, considering each word and making sure none of them implies anything hateful or discriminating.

Announcement Subject Lines

Announcement subject lines are a great way to inform subscribers about new products or services. When doing so, considering the relevant factors mentioned in the beginning of this article can be of utmost importance. Not only understanding the industry’s average open rate should be taken into account, but also understanding different content relevancy, send time, frequency and email list quality. Utilizing these guidelines and taking them into account when crafting emails can ensure an increased open rate.

Sentence structure and choice of words should also be tailored to the particular brand’s target audience. An appropriate sentence structure can spark enthusiasm and convey enthusiasm through simple verbiage. Additionally, employing action words and verbs throughout the message to stand out of the crowd can go a long way in catching the reader’s eye. And, if necessary, adding urgency to the subject line can induce readers to take action without hesitation.

Using creativity and planning ahead can go a long way in crafting effective and compelling email campaigns. Ultimately, when utilizing announcements in subject lines, using buzzwords like “new”, “launch” or “introducing” can help the email stand out and make strategies more successful.

Shocking Subject Lines

Shocking subject lines can be a great way to grab the attention of readers and to drive up open rates. Using phrases like “Is this really happening to you?” or introducing topics that may catch people off guard can be used strategically to lure readers into opening the email. However, careful consideration should be given to the content itself to guarantee that the shocking approach is relevant and not illegal or dangerous in any way.

Unexpectedly including references to popular film, song, or book titles can sometimes be effective. Although these could have a short shelf life due to cultural appropriation and occurrence of new buzzwords over time, when used sensitively and appropriately, these references can be eye-catching and possibly induce people to click. Just as importantly, the content itself should live up to the expectations the subject line sets out.

Finding the perfect balance between shock and intrigue can be hard to master, however, it can make all the difference. When possible, try to create curiosity around the email; prompting people to explore the content further can prove beneficial for the email open rates. Regardless of the direction chosen, it is essential to understand the reader’s profile and thoughtfully consider how to adjust the subject line to increase its effectiveness.

Tips for Improving Your Email Open Rate

In today’s highly competitive email marketing environment, understanding your email open rate and actively finding ways to improve it is critical to achieving successful email campaigns. Open rate, which is the percentage of emails opened by recipients, is a good indicator of your email performance, overall engagement and conversion rate. It is generally accepted that higher open rates are likely to lead to higher click-through and conversion rates.

However, trying to increase your email open rates can be a daunting task. There could be myriad of factors influencing how subscribers engage with your emails, including content relevancy, send time frequency, and quality of your email list. To help you get started on increasing your email open rate, here is a breakdown of some tips and best practices used by seasoned email marketers.

Personalizing subject lines with first names, using emojis creatively, testing different elements within emails, keeping subscriber’s interests in mind when crafting the content, and writing announcements, humorous or shocking subject lines are all effective techniques which can contribute towards improving open rates. It is important to remember to keep subject lines short and snappy, to include links in emails, optimize images, avoid spam filters and ultimately ensure successful deliverability.

Segmenting your list based on location, interests or activity is another great way of engaging customers better, as well as resending unopened emails to subscribers every now and again. Finally, it is also important to avoid spamming subscribers and to provide value in emails instead of just promoting products and services.

Use First Name in Subject Lines

What better way to engage subscribers than to personalize their email experience by addressing them directly by their first name? There are numerous studies which prove that adding a first name to the subject line leads to an average lift of open rate from 3 percent to 40 percent depending upon the industry sector.

For instance, email subject lines such as “Hey [first name], don’t miss out on this early access discount!” not only capture user attention but may also entice them to click through as it reflects relevance and value.

Subject lines should also remain short and snappy, to avoid overwhelming the reader with too much information at once.

Use Emojis in Subject Lines

Using emojis in email subject lines can pique the curiosity of your subscribers, resulting in higher open rates. Consider using emojis which match the tone of the brand and message. Furthermore, emojis should complement rather than distract from the message.

For example, if the subject line is announcing something new, such as a blog post, one could use an emoji of a pair of eyes focusing on the new product. It is essential to remember to keep the number of emojis used to a maximum of three, to minimize confusion and distraction from the main message.

Watch Out for the Spam Filters

Email deliverability is something that should always be taken into account when sending out emails. Delivered emails will still need to pass through local spam filter and global anti-spam filters, which detect and flag any emails containing malicious content or too many hard bounces.

When creating emails, it is important to optimize images, avoid certain punctuation and words, and reduce bounce rates to improve deliverability and open rates. Another aspect to consider is optimizing emails so they render properly across different email clients; staying within industry benchmarks is the key.

Keep in Mind Your Subscriber’s Interests

When personalizing emails, marketers should consider data collected during sign up such as age and interests, which can be leveraged to tailor content specifically to certain segments. For instance, email address, gender, birthdate and interests are segmented pieces of data that can be utilized to optimize email campaigns.

Within each segmented list, content should also be tailored around interests or preferences in order to strengthen relevance and capture attention. Such strategies have been proven to result in higher open rates when compared to generic content.

Get Unsubscribers’ Feedback

Executing a survey for email users who have chosen to opt-out from mailing lists can provide marketers with valuable insights. What kind of preferences can such surveys uncover? By providing subscribers with the option to personalize their email preferences, engagement rates are likely to increase.

A/B Test Everything

A/B testing allows marketers to compare two versions of a web page, email, or advertisement in order to determine which one performs better. By testing different elements such as headlines, images, and copywriting styles, marketers can gain valuable insights into what resonates with their target audience. Metaphors, similes, personification and alliteration are some of the most commonly tested stylistic devices used to capture attention and drive engagement. A/B testing helps marketers make informed decisions about future campaigns by providing data-driven evidence on what works best for their customers.

Proofread the Emails Before Sending

Before sending any emails, it is essential to proofread it thoroughly. This ensures accuracy and avoids mistakes, miscommunication or typos which can cause a drop in engagement rates.

Images should also be formatted correctly and be sized appropriately, with compression set to a maximum of 600kb.

Lastly, mailchimp tracks engagement in an a/b testing campaign but it is important that separate sets of contacts should be sent alternative versions to measure the impact of changes. This approach also applies to a single call-to-action, where it is a good practice to include multiple links to the same page in case one link fails to load.

Resend Unopened Emails

Sending unopened emails to subscribers can help increase your email open rate, as long as the content of the email is considered up to date and relevant. To ensure deliverability, always track open and bounce rates, count hard bounces and also keep an eye on spam complaints.

After resending the email, study how your subscribers respond to the re-sent version government related emails.

Don’t Spam the Subscribers

Finally, it is essential that email marketers create a balance between promotional emails and ones filled with valuable content. Sending too many promotional emails can cause a drop in engagement and open rates. Remember, Deliverability and Frequency play an important role in maintaining good sender reputation and open rates.

The best way to avoid this is to have automated triggers in place or to manually segment your list and send timely and relevant emails. To maintain a successful email marketing automation campaign, it is imperative to focus on providing valuable content and avoiding spamming subscribers.

Summary

When it comes to email campaigns, open rate is critical for measuring success and informing future strategies. Every industry experiences different average open rates, with factors such as content relevancy, send time, frequency, and email list quality impacting results. In order to maximize open rate, marketers should employ best practices such as personalizing subject lines and creating content with valuable upgrades, as well as curating laughable and shocking subject lines as appropriate.

Employing action words in emails, segmenting lists and avoiding spamming are also important measures that can be taken to increase open rate and improve deliverability. A/B testing should be used throughout the process and emails double-checked before they are sent.

Asking unsubscribers for feedback to tailor their preferences, incorporating emojis, watching out for spam filters and ensuring content relevancy and send times are relevant are also key tips for boosting open rate. Taking these steps into account and making sure to provide value instead of just promotions can help ensure a successful email marketing campaign.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a good open rate for email?

Email open rates are an important metric for measuring the success of a marketing campaign, and having a good open rate is essential. A good open rate should be between 17-28%, and the results can vary depending on the health of your list and the quality of your subject lines.

It’s also helpful to compare your benchmark data and metrics with the benchmarks for your industry.

Is a 40% email open rate good?

A 40% open rate can be considered good, particularly when compared to the industry standard. However, a successful email marketing campaign typically dispatches messages with an open rate of 20% to 40% or higher.

As such, reach for the highest open rate possible by focusing on beating your records – not your competition.

Is 50% email open rate good?

Having a 50% email open rate is an impressive feat and could be considered good, depending on the industry and quality of your email list. Generally speaking, anything above education industry average (17.92%) can be seen as a success.

Is 30% a good open rate?

A 30% open rate is an excellent score and significantly higher than the average open rate of 10-15%.

As such, this indicates that your emails are effectively engaging customers and should be considered a great success!

What is a good marketing email click rate?

A good click-through rate for email campaigns is between 2-5%, depending on the industry. To gain further insight and understand what benchmark works best for your campaign, we suggest taking a look at our report for more industry-specific metrics.