How does excluding bot clicks in Klaviyo affect email click rates and segmentation?
Summary
What email marketers say12Marketer opinions
Email marketer from Email Marketing Forum says that it's crucial to A/B test segments with and without bot click exclusions to determine which approach yields better conversion rates. If segments without exclusions generate more revenue, then those contacts should not be excluded.
Email marketer from Marketing Over Coffee Forum details that after excluding bot clicks, adjusting email frequency based on revised engagement data can help optimize campaign performance. Over-mailing segments with low genuine engagement can harm deliverability and unsubscribes, so tailoring frequency is important.
Email marketer from Mailgun details that when analyzing the impact of bot click exclusions, segmenting by acquisition source can provide insights into which channels are more prone to bot activity. This helps in refining targeting and improving overall campaign performance.
Email marketer from Email Marketing Tips Blog discusses that the blog post emphasizes that while excluding Non-Human Interaction (NHI) bot clicks can provide a cleaner view of engagement, it's essential to ensure that legitimate early clicks from highly engaged users are not inadvertently filtered out. Marketers should use a nuanced approach, combining bot click data with other engagement metrics to make informed decisions about audience segmentation.
Email marketer from Email Growth Hacking discusses sharing tips on balancing bot exclusion and real engagement in their blog. They advise using advanced segmentation criteria beyond just bot clicks, such as combining engagement time and purchase history to refine segments.
Email marketer from Stack Exchange shares that using customer data platforms (CDP) alongside Klaviyo can help in enriching customer profiles with website behavior data, purchase history, and other engagement metrics. This leads to more accurate segmentation and reduces reliance solely on bot click data.
Marketer from Email Geeks clarifies that Klaviyo's NHI detection is per event, so if a bot clicks then a human clicks, you’d see the real event in the campaign metrics. They also recommend that you should never suppress people or exclude because they have NHI activity. Instead in your segment just scope it so it looks at clicks that are confirmed human (Example: Has Clicked Email in the last X days where Bot Clicks equals false).
Marketer from Email Geeks suggests A/B testing with & without the bot-click exclusions, and incorporate conversion tracking if possible and if you make money from the segments without bot-click exclusions, then don't exclude them.
Marketer from Email Geeks says that you shouldn’t exclude anyone from the sending just when you parse your actual data for analytics, relating to opens for bot reasons.
Email marketer from Quora shares that after excluding bot clicks, they observed a more realistic click-through rate. Previously inflated metrics led to misinformed decisions about content and timing. However, they caution against aggressive exclusion, as it can reduce audience size.
Email marketer from Email Content Strategy describes that interpreting bot click data can be enhanced by analyzing content engagement. For example, correlating bot clicks with low time-on-page can validate the bot activity, while high engagement despite early clicks could indicate genuine interest.
Email marketer from Reddit shares that excluding bot clicks initially seemed to improve their click-through rates, but they noticed a decrease in overall engagement as they were also filtering out genuinely interested users who clicked quickly. They now use bot click data for analysis, not suppression.
What the experts say5Expert opinions
Expert from Word to the Wise explains that using NHI data to suppress sends requires careful consideration, as legitimate early clicks from highly engaged users should not be inadvertently filtered out. Marketers should consider that a human may also see an react to a mail even if there is NHI traffic on the email.
Expert from Email Geeks suggests that Klaviyo's removal of "bot clicks" might be removing some human traffic as well, as B2C mail doesn't typically have a huge problem with NHI clicks.
Expert from Email Geeks suggests checking email performance by each of the top domains separately and also by acquisition source.
Expert from Email Geeks advises that if Klaviyo's bot click detection data has been used to inform segmentation, and if Klaviyo may be over aggressive, it might be worth looking at those decisions again, as it might exclude those who aren't bots.
Expert from Email Geeks explains that they wouldn't expect to see high NHI click rates on B2C streams and if Klaviyo have been marking a significant fraction of clicks as "bot" I'd be suspicious of their heuristics. Also, using NHI data to suppress sends requires some thought, as just because there's a NHI click doesn't mean a human doesn't also see and react to the mail.
What the documentation says6Technical articles
Documentation from Litmus explains that accurate email metrics are crucial for making informed decisions about email marketing strategies. Excluding bot clicks helps in achieving this accuracy, although marketers should be careful not to exclude legitimate early engagement.
Documentation from Klaviyo explains that Klaviyo automatically detects and filters out bot clicks to provide more accurate engagement metrics, helping users focus on genuine human interactions. However, excluding these clicks can lead to underreporting of initial engagement if real users click shortly after a bot.
Documentation from Klaviyo details that if you are excluding anyone with bot clicks from your segments, you are likely excluding some real people who may have engaged quickly, meaning your segmentation might not be entirely accurate.
Documentation from Google Analytics shows marketers can correlate Klaviyo data with Google Analytics data to validate the authenticity of clicks. Unusual patterns such as high click rates but low website traffic may indicate bot activity, which influences segmentation and click rates.
Documentation from ZeroBounce explains that excluding bot clicks contributes to improving email deliverability by giving a more realistic engagement picture to mailbox providers, reducing the risk of being flagged as spam. They recommend monitoring metrics closely after implementing such exclusions.
Documentation from Email Analytics Pro details that bot clicks can significantly skew click rates, making campaigns appear more successful than they are. Excluding these can provide a more accurate view of human engagement, but should be balanced with understanding user behavior.