Measuring and Improving Key Benchmarks for your Display Ads and Emails

Email Benchmarks

An estimated 306.4 billion emails will be sent every day. Over 50% are promotional in nature. Now, take into account that just over 20% of these are undelivered or go straight to the spam box. Keeping track of and working to improve several key metrics can ensure you get the most out of your email campaigns.

Below are some key email metrics that will help you measure and track the success of your email campaigns as well as some ways to improve them.

Unique Open Rate
Unique Click Rate
Unsubscribe Rate

Unique Open Rate

The unique open rate is the percentage of unique email recipients who open a given email. Open Rates give you a sense of how interested your audience is in the content that you are sending them.

Tactics to improve Open Rates

Keep the subject line clear and actionable. Visit our help center for more tips on writing effective subject lines.
Make sure the sender information (the ‘from’ address) is reputable. Customers won’t open an email if they don’t trust the source.
Select a send time that works best for your audience.
- - Data shows that emails sent on a Tuesday are more likely to be opened (with weekdays generally working better than weekends) and that the rates of opening emails was highest at 10 AM and 1 PM, with another after-work spike at 6 PM.
  - Far fewer emails are sent during weekends.
  - Use A/B testing to find the time that works best for your email sends
Use a clear pre-header text that describes the content and that stands out. A pre-header is the summary text that follows the subject line when an email is viewed in the inbox.
Maintain proper list hygiene. Remove any stale addresses.

Unique Click Rate

The unique click rate is a percentage that tells you how many successfully delivered emails registered at least one click.

Tactics to improve Click Rates

Focus on content that resonates with the audience. Engaging content that is timely and well written will generate higher click rates.
Use visually interesting graphics or photos that immediately capture attention and tie directly to the message of the email.
Ensure the layout and the size of the buttons are easy to navigate and click.
Segment your email lists based on subscriber interests.
- - For example: if you have a wide range of products, ensure that you are sending the right product-based emails to the right segment of your list.
Personalize your emails.

Delivery Rate

The delivery rate is the percentage of emails that get delivered versus get bounced due to an invalid email address.

Tactics to improve Delivery Rates

Use a double opt-in email verification at the initial point of first interaction. Double opt-ins are completed by sending a confirmation email to the new subscriber asking to validate their address and gain consent.
Keep your email lists up-to-date. Older mailing lists containing outdated, abandoned, and uninterested recipients can have a negative impact on deliverability rates.
Use a consistent email send schedule.
Ensure your subject lines do not contain spam-related phrasing like “Free!” or “Discount!”.

Unsubscribe Rate

The unsubscribe rate is the percentage of customers that request to unsubscribe from your email campaigns and receive no further email content.

Tactics to improve Unsubscribe Rates

Use segmentation in your email sends. Customers are less likely to unsubscribe if they feel that the content is tailored to their interests.
Don’t overdo it on your subject lines.
- - Avoid aggressive tones such as “Open this!” or “Are you avoiding me?”
  - DON’T USE ALL CAPS
  - Do not use any sort of fake reply indicators such as “re:” or “fwd”. This can lead to a loss in customer trust
Keep your content fresh and useful.
Keep email frequency in mind. There isn’t a perfect, one-size-fits-all email frequency. Too few and customers may have a harder time remembering you, too many and you may annoy them or end up in a spam filter. Test out differing email frequencies to find your sweet spot
Ensure that unsubscribing is easy and straightforward. This will make a good impression on the customer on their way out, and perhaps they will even return one day.

Display Ads Benchmarks

Keeping track of key ad metrics will help evaluate your marketing campaigns’ progress, what’s working well, and what needs to change. Below are some key display metrics that will help you measure and track the success of your campaigns as well as some ways to improve them.

CPM (cost per mille)

The cost required to purchase and serve 1000 impressions.

Tactics to improve CPM

Target the right audience to make sure your effectively reaching the right customers.
Broaden your targeting. If your target audience is too small, it can sometimes require higher CPMs to win these impressions. Expanding your audience gives you more opportunities to win impressions and could lower your overall CPM needed to win them
A/B test your ads.
Ensure all major ad sizes are being utilized. More potential impression opportunities can result in a lower CPM. Utilize all of the major ad sizes to have open up as many bid opportunities as possible

Click based metrics

CPC (cost per click)
CTR (Clickthrough Rate)

CPC (cost per click)

CPC is the amount you pay every time a user clicks your ad.

CTR (Clickthrough Rate)

Click through rate measures how often people who view an ad end up clicking on it. It is calculated by dividing the number of impressions served by the number of clicks.

Tactics to improve CPC & CTR

Refine your audience so your targeting leads with relevant content. It will help increase engagement with your ads
A/B test different creative to identify which ads generate more clicks
Create a clear CTA that is persuasive and demonstrates why a customer should click on the ad
Include promotions or benefits in your ads, such as showcasing that you offer free shipping or a sale.
Utilize impactful or visually interesting graphics.