Click-to-Open Rates

I recently attended a webinar that focused on the subject of Click-to-Open Rates (CTORs). Unique opens and clicks are often the stats marketers look at to determine the success of an email, and these are the stats most prominently displayed by email marketing platforms. However, CTOR is growing in popularity as a better measuring stick of the success of an email.

Click Through Rate = Unique Clicks / Delivered x 100
Click-to-Open Rate = Unique Clicks / Unique Opens x 100

Why is CTOR useful?
A low open rate can dilute your Click Through Rate (CTR), even if a large percentage of the openers clicked on your email. CTOR measures the percentage of recipients who opened and clicked, so it’s great for monitoring whether the content of your email resonates with your subscribers.
Since the only recipients who see your message are the ones who opened the email, it makes sense to measure clicks based on those who opened the email. A high CTOR means your content did what it was supposed to do.

What is a good CTOR?
The webinar said 10 – 15 %, but I also ran into different numbers while doing some more reading. The best way to determine a good Click-to-Open Rate for clients is to benchmark against past emails.

Improving CTOR!
How to improve a client’s CTOR will vary from client to client, but a poor Click-to-Open Rate could be due to multiple causes and each should be considered to find issues and improve CTOR. Some of the possible problems could be long or dense email content, vague content, or failing to deliver what your subject line promises. Another concern to explore is competing, unclear, or uncompelling CTAs in your email content.