Like Rocketseed, many of our competitors can report each time a recipient clicks on the hyperlinks added to email messages. Depending on how this is done, the actual click-through rates might not be as impressive as those reported by the email marketing tool. Read on to find out why…
One of the most powerful features of email marketing software is the ability to add graphical email signature banners to each outbound email sent by your employees. These banners can contain hyperlinks that take visitors to landing pages on your web site that promote products, notify about upcoming events or otherwise strengthen your brand. Banner campaigns can be tailored to individuals, groups and entire companies.
The added marketing content can be configured to generate alerts whenever a receiver of a branded email clicks on a tracked hyperlink. The sender of the email, your sales team, or others can be notified in real time whenever this happens. In addition, reports are available to show which banners and campaigns are receiving the most responses.
The problem is caused by automated mail scanner software. In recent years a number of products have been launched to protect customers’ inboxes from malicious emails. These tools visit every hyperlink within each inbound email to make sure the links are safe to click. This is sometimes offered in addition to the basic antivirus practice of scanning each email attachment for malware. As more individuals employ such tools this can affect your email marketing results.
Most tools fail to distinguish the automated clicks generated by robotic scanners from real clicks by actual human readers of your email. The result is inflated click-through rates. Every mail sent to users of these scanners will appear to have had each link visited, even though the recipient never saw the linked content. In some cases, as many as one half of all reported clicks on email marketing material are generated by robots rather than by humans.
Rocketseed actively detects this behaviour and eliminates it from real-time click alerts and reporting data. As new sources of robotic clicks are detected we update our software to filter out the fakes. Does your email marketing vendor do the same?
If you are looking for the most accurate and reliable insights into your customers’ behaviour be sure to use a tool that provides meaningful, believable results. To truly determine which campaigns are having the most impact use a tool that filters out the noise. Contact your local Rocketseed sales representative to learn more
