Click-through rate (email)

An open only tells you the subject line worked. Click-through rate tells you the message inside moved someone to act, which connects email to the rest of the funnel: no click, no landing page visit, no lead.

It is the sturdier signal. Since email apps can register opens that no person made, clicks are a more reliable sign of real interest than opens. A campaign with a good open rate and a weak click rate usually has a problem in the body or the offer, not the subject line.

It also guides what to test. Opens are mostly a subject-line and sender question. Clicks are a question of content, link placement and call to action. Knowing which number is weak tells you which part to change, and stops you editing the subject line to fix a click problem.

Expect large differences by type of email. A receipt or a password reset gets clicked because the reader needs it. A promotional broadcast sees fewer clicks. Compare each type with its own history, not with an average from other companies.

1. Calculate it from delivered emails. Divide unique clicks by emails delivered, not by emails sent and not by opens, and note which figure your tool reports.
2. Set a baseline per email type. Newsletters, promotions, product updates and onboarding emails behave differently. Record the last six sends of each and compare new ones with those.
3. Put the main link high. Place the primary link near the top of the email and repeat it once near the end, for readers who skim.
4. Make link text say what the reader gets. "Download the pricing benchmark" beats "Learn more". Let the link carry the value.
5. Test one thing at a time. Change the call to action wording, or its position, or the offer, not all three. Test subject lines separately, since they affect opens, not clicks.
6. Segment before you judge. Compare new subscribers, active customers and lapsed contacts apart. A healthy overall figure can hide a segment that is slipping.
7. Read it with what follows the click. If clicks rise and sign-ups do not, the problem has moved to the landing page.

Email click-through rate is the share of recipients who click at least one link in a message. It is calculated as clicks divided by emails delivered, multiplied by 100. Say a business delivers 12,000 emails and 276 recipients click. The click-through rate is 2.3 per cent.

Two things are easy to mix up. Open rate counts people who opened the email, and it can be inflated by privacy features that load the message automatically. Click-to-open rate divides clicks by opens instead of by delivered emails. With 2,880 opens in the same send, clicks divided by opens is about 9.6 per cent. It is useful for judging the content of the email among those who opened it, but it is a different figure and should not be compared with click-through rate.

Also check whether your tool counts unique clicks (one per person) or total clicks (every click, including repeats). The two can differ by a wide margin. This page is about email only. For ads, search results and social posts, see Click-through rate (CTR).

• Dividing by opens and calling it click-through rate. That is click-to-open rate, and it will always look higher.
• Mixing unique and total clicks. Compare like with like, or the trend will move for the wrong reason.
• Counting bot clicks. Some security scanners open every link in an email. If clicks arrive within seconds of sending, filter them out where your tool allows.
• Judging by one send. One email sent on a bank holiday says little. Look at the trend over several sends.
• Chasing clicks with a misleading link. A vague promise earns a click and a bounce. It lowers the value of the list and teaches the audience to ignore you.
• Fixing the wrong number. A weak click rate is not repaired by a new subject line.