How to improve click-through rate when open rates are consistent across ESPs?

Summary

When open rates are consistent across ESPs, improving click-through rates demands a comprehensive marketing and technical approach. While deliverability ensures emails reach the inbox, the subsequent engagement depends on optimizing content, user experience, and subscriber expectations. Personalization, compelling subject lines, clear CTAs, A/B testing, and segmentation are vital. Incorporating interactive elements, leveraging behavioral email marketing, and optimizing images can enhance engagement. Mobile optimization, email accessibility, and a strong sender reputation are crucial technical considerations. Reducing friction in the user journey and ensuring emails are relevant, timely, and valuable are also key. Furthermore, email frequency must be tailored to avoid subscriber fatigue. Lastly, it is important to track and analyse campaign performance for continual improvement. The content must match the subscribers expectations that are set by the subject line.

Key findings

  • Personalization: Personalizing content and CTAs based on subscriber data significantly improves relevance and engagement.
  • A/B Testing: A/B testing various email elements identifies optimal configurations for higher click-through rates.
  • Segmentation: Segmenting email lists ensures targeted and relevant content that drives higher engagement.
  • Value Proposition: Clearly communicating value and benefits motivates subscribers to click.
  • Interactive Content: Incorporating interactive elements increases engagement and click-through rates.
  • Behavioral Marketing: Triggering emails based on subscriber actions ensures timely and highly relevant content.
  • Mobile Optimization: Responsive design, legible fonts, and appropriately sized buttons improve the mobile user experience, and so increase click-through rates.
  • Email Accessibility: Alt text, sufficient color contrast, and semantic structure enhance usability for all subscribers.
  • Image Optimization: Optimized images enhance the user experience and prevent loading issues.
  • Reducing Friction: A reduction of friction makes it easier for users to follow through to conversion from the email.

Key considerations

  • Marketing Responsibility: Marketing teams should take ownership of strategies to improve click-through rates after deliverability is achieved.
  • Relevance: Ensure email content is highly relevant to the recipient's interests and needs.
  • Timeliness: Send emails at the right time, triggered by specific subscriber actions or behaviors.
  • Value: Provide clear and compelling value in every email to motivate clicks.
  • Subscriber Expectations: Ensure email content aligns with what the subject line promises.
  • Actionable Steps: Make it easy for subscribers to understand what action you want them to take.
  • Email Frequency: Determine the optimal email frequency to avoid subscriber fatigue and maintain engagement.
  • Data-Driven Decisions: Base strategies on data insights derived from tracking and analysis.

What email marketers say
12Marketer opinions

When open rates are consistent across ESPs, improving click-through rates requires a focus on optimizing email content and user experience. Personalization, compelling subject lines, clear CTAs, A/B testing, and segmentation are crucial. Interactive content, behavioral email marketing, and optimized images can further enhance engagement. Reducing friction in the user journey and ensuring emails are relevant, timely, and valuable are also essential. Furthermore, email frequency and content should be tailored to avoid fatigue.

Key opinions

  • Personalization: Personalizing content and CTAs based on subscriber data improves relevance and engagement.
  • A/B Testing: A/B testing various email elements identifies optimal configurations for higher click-through rates.
  • Segmentation: Segmenting email lists ensures targeted, relevant content that drives higher engagement.
  • Value Proposition: Clearly communicating value and benefits motivates subscribers to click.
  • Interactive Content: Incorporating interactive elements increases engagement and click-through rates.
  • Behavioral Marketing: Triggering emails based on subscriber actions ensures timely and relevant content.
  • Image Optimization: Optimized images enhance the user experience and prevent loading issues.
  • Reducing Friction: Make it easy for users to follow through to conversion from the email.

Key considerations

  • Relevance: Ensure email content is highly relevant to the recipient's interests and needs.
  • Timeliness: Send emails at the right time, triggered by specific subscriber actions or behaviors.
  • Value: Provide clear and compelling value in every email to motivate clicks.
  • Email Frequency: Determine the optimal email frequency to avoid subscriber fatigue and maintain engagement.
  • User Journey: Ensure a seamless journey from inbox to conversion, reducing any potential friction.
  • Content Matching: Ensure the content matches the subscriber's expectations that are set by the subject line.
Marketer view

Email marketer from Quora answers that clearly communicating the value proposition in your email copy and highlighting the benefits that subscribers will receive by clicking through can motivate them to take action.

May 2024 - Quora
Marketer view

Email marketer from EmailGeeks forum answers that incorporating interactive content such as quizzes, polls, or surveys within emails can grab the attention of recipients and increase click-through rates.

July 2021 - EmailGeeks
Marketer view

Email marketer from HubSpot Blog answers that segmenting email lists and sending targeted messages to specific groups of subscribers based on their interests and behaviors can improve click-through rates because the content is more relevant.

September 2023 - HubSpot Blog
Marketer view

Email marketer from SuperOffice shares that reduce friction by making it easy for subscribers to click through. This means that the journey from their inbox to their point of conversion needs to be as seamless as possible.

May 2023 - SuperOffice Blog
Marketer view

Email marketer from Mailchimp Blog explains that personalizing email content, crafting compelling subject lines, and using clear call-to-actions can significantly improve click-through rates even if open rates are consistent.

January 2025 - Mailchimp Blog
Marketer view

Email marketer from Campaign Monitor Blog shares that optimizing images for email by compressing them, using appropriate file formats, and adding alt text ensures that they load quickly and display properly across all devices, which can indirectly improve click-through rates.

November 2024 - Campaign Monitor Blog
Marketer view

Email marketer from Reddit shares that personalizing the call to action text based on the recipient's past behavior or profile data can significantly improve engagement and click-through rates.

April 2023 - Reddit
Marketer view

Email marketer from Neil Patel's Blog shares that A/B testing different email elements such as subject lines, body copy, and button colors can help identify which versions resonate best with subscribers and drive higher click-through rates.

June 2021 - Neil Patel's Blog
Marketer view

Email marketer from Reddit answers that determining the optimal email frequency for your audience and avoiding email fatigue by not sending too many emails too often can improve engagement and click-through rates.

September 2024 - Reddit
Marketer view

Marketer from Email Geeks presents a problem: Open rates are the same across ESPs, but CTR is significantly different despite using the same content.

April 2022 - Email Geeks
Marketer view

Email marketer from ActiveCampaign Blog explains that leveraging behavioral email marketing by triggering emails based on specific actions taken by subscribers on your website or within your app can improve click-through rates because the content is highly relevant and timely.

June 2023 - ActiveCampaign Blog
Marketer view

Marketer from Email Geeks sarcastically suggests that improving inbox deliverability may worsen the click problem by raising the rate of delivered vs. opened vs. clicked emails.

September 2024 - Email Geeks

What the experts say
3Expert opinions

Experts suggest that improving click-through rates, when open rates are consistent, falls under the purview of marketing. Deliverability experts focus on inbox placement, but engagement is driven by content relevance, meeting subscriber expectations set by the subject line, and clear calls to action.

Key opinions

  • Deliverability vs. Engagement: Deliverability focuses on inbox placement, while engagement (click-throughs) is a marketing concern.
  • Content Relevance: Tailoring content to match expectations set by the subject line is crucial.
  • Clear CTAs: Providing clear calls to action is essential for driving clicks.

Key considerations

  • Marketing Responsibility: Marketing teams should take ownership of strategies to improve click-through rates.
  • Subscriber Expectations: Ensure email content aligns with what the subject line promises.
  • Actionable Steps: Make it easy for subscribers to understand what action you want them to take.
Expert view

Expert from Word to the Wise answers that once you've achieved the open, focus on tailoring the content to match subscriber expectations set by the subject line, ensuring relevance, and providing clear calls to action to drive click-throughs.

January 2023 - Word to the Wise
Expert view

Expert from Email Geeks responds that click-throughs are out of scope and that it is Marketing’s problem.

October 2024 - Email Geeks
Expert view

Expert from Email Geeks states her job is done once mail makes it to the inbox, but she can’t make people click.

December 2022 - Email Geeks

What the documentation says
4Technical articles

Documentation suggests that improving click-through rates, when open rates are consistent, involves several technical and analytical best practices. Optimizing for mobile devices, ensuring accessibility, and maintaining a good sender reputation contribute to a better user experience and improved deliverability, which indirectly influences click-through rates. Properly tracking campaign performance and analyzing data enables continuous improvement through informed decision-making.

Key findings

  • Mobile Optimization: Responsive design, legible fonts, and appropriately sized buttons improve the mobile user experience.
  • Email Accessibility: Alt text, sufficient color contrast, and semantic structure enhance usability for all subscribers.
  • Sender Reputation: Authentication, avoiding spam triggers, and managing unsubscribes ensure good deliverability.
  • Performance Tracking: Using UTM parameters and analyzing data in Google Analytics informs strategy.

Key considerations

  • User Experience: Prioritize a seamless and enjoyable experience for all subscribers.
  • Inclusive Design: Make emails accessible to users with disabilities.
  • Deliverability Practices: Implement best practices to maintain a positive sender reputation.
  • Data-Driven Decisions: Base strategies on data insights derived from tracking and analysis.
Technical article

Documentation from Google Analytics explains that properly tracking email campaign performance with UTM parameters and analyzing the data in Google Analytics helps you understand which tactics are working and identify areas for improvement.

August 2023 - Google Analytics
Technical article

Documentation from Litmus explains that optimizing emails for mobile devices by using responsive design, legible font sizes, and appropriately sized buttons helps ensure a positive user experience, leading to higher click-through rates.

February 2022 - Litmus
Technical article

Documentation from Email on Acid shares that designing accessible emails with alt text for images, sufficient color contrast, and proper semantic structure makes emails more usable for all subscribers, potentially increasing click-through rates.

July 2022 - Email on Acid
Technical article

Documentation from SendGrid answers that maintaining a good sender reputation by authenticating emails, avoiding spam triggers, and promptly removing unsubscribed recipients improves deliverability and ensures that your emails reach the inbox, indirectly impacting click-through rates.

September 2022 - SendGrid