status report test

Updated September 21, 2021

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Reports & Data

~~Core Email Engagement Metrics~~
~~Core Subscriber Business Metrics~~
~~Authentication~~
~~Spam Reports~~
Domain settings
DNS settings
IP address

Additional Analysis

Technical Factors
Automations
Segmentation Strategy
Personalization Strategy
Operations

Testing

Placement Testing

Core Metrics

Email Optimization Index for status report test

Notes

Overall Open Rate

Engaged Subscribers Open Rate

Percentage of Audience with Low Engagement

Engaged audience growth percentage over past 30 days

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Technical Factors

Technical Factors Summary

Notes

All Technical Factors

Authentication

Background & Recommendations

SPF (Sender Policy Framework), DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail), and DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance) are technical standards that help protect against email domains being used for harmful activities. They each present a different layer or method for internet service providers and email platforms to ensure an email address isn’t benign spoofed or used to send spam. These protocols verify that emails being sent are being done so from an authorized system. It’s important that each of these protocols is correctly configured to match your domain and email platform so your messages are not mistaken for spam. Proper DMARC settings also provide instructions to email providers on what to do if an email is sent without authentication on what to do with it (quarantine vs. reject). Typically quarantine is fine but if you are experiencing a very high rate of attempts to use your domain for spam it may be beneficially to set the DMARC instructions to Reject. If there are high amounts of unauthenticated email it can mean your system is not properly configured, that people may be attempting to spoof your domain for sending spam messages, or that one of your systems that sends email with your domain isn’t properly configured. Some number of DMARC failures is normal – sometimes when people forward your email from certain email tools such as Outlook it can record it as unauthenticated. Unless your number of unauthenticated emails is above 2% it’s nothing to worry about.

Authentication Reports

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Spam Analysis

Analysis Background & Recommendation

Google post master tools shows the number of email recipients who mark a message as spam within their platform. This score should be as low as possible but scores over 2% are of concern and should be monitored. If your list is well maintained, consistently communicated with, and you use best practices in your emails and are still experiencing high-spam rates there are a few areas we recommend evaluating. 1 – List Health – “Deadweight” subscribers that are not engaged and don’t open emails frequently are much more likely to mark messages as spam. Conducting regular list cleanups of non-engaged subscribers is important. 2 – Automations – You should do a careful evaluation of automations that are running within your ESP platform. If you have errant automations that are triggering too many messages or sending the wrong details to the wrong people it can significantly drive up the spam percentage. Another factor with automations is that they are typically going to a smaller subset of your audience and not your full list. On a given day if you have an automation that sends a message to 100 people on a given day and 5 of them mark the message as spam your spam percentage will be 5% because the overall list size you sent the email to is small compared to a full-list send. 3 – Phishing or Spam Attacks – High spam percentages can be a warning symptom that someone is using your domain or systems to send SPAM messages without your knowledge. We cover how-to-steps in detail for this elsewhere but it may be necessary to adjust your DMARC settings to “reject” any email without proper authentication which tells email providers to reject any email from your domain not coming from an authenticated source. Another thing to check is all the systems that have permission to send via your domain in DNS settings and verify that there are no old ones no longer in use. We’ve experienced clients who have left certain email providers and gone to new ones but left the permissions for the old provider active which can leave them open for potential hijacking. Also verify that your websites (particularly wordpress and other CMS platforms) are secure and not sending emails. Website and software platforms sending emails on your behalf should ideally use a transactional email service for basic emails like password resets, etc.

Spam Analysis Reports

Is any authentication failure above 2%?

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Domain

Analysis Background & Recommendation

Email platforms and internet service providers use black lists of domains and IP addresses as a way to identify potential SPAM. It can be normal for shared IP addresses to have some black listings. Thankfully most black lists allow you to submit a request to be removed. If you are using dedicated IP addresses you should pay very close attention to this because all blacklistings are squarely within your purview to dispute or cause behavior that could impact black list status. Shared IP addresses can be impacted by other people operating on the same IP.

Domain Analysis Reports

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IP Address

Analysis Background & Recommendation

Email service providers act like security guards for email inboxes. They monitor traffic that is coming in for potential threats. The primary way they monitor this is by looking at the IP address emails are coming from. If an IP address has lots of spam associated with it, high unsubscribe, low engagement, and a history of other negative factors they are more likely to classify the messages as spam or put them in quarantine. If you have a dedicated IP address your sender reputation is solely based off of your list health. If you are on a shared IP address then your reputation is mixed with other senders. If someone else on your shared IP is engaging in negative email behavior it reflects badly on everyone else on the same IP. Most ESPs do their best to monitor this and keep everyone on an IP at an acceptable level. Shared IPs tend to have more of a medium IP health in general. Dedicated IPs aren’t automatically better because you have to be able to take complete responsibility for monitoring and maintaining the health of your email list. Sometimes it makes more sense to outsource this to your ESP. If you transition to a dedicated IP address it’s important to do so with proper processes that establishes the credibility of your new IP.

Does your email send from a dedicated or shared IP address?

IP Analysis Reports

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DNS Settings

Background & Recommendation

Domain Name Server settings (DNS) are the instructions that connect your domain name to various services such as web hosting and email. To send email properly systems need to be authenticated via your DNS settings. Sometimes it can be surprising the number of services that need to be connected to send messages. For example your e-commerce platform may need permission to send receipts under your domain, your customer support software may need permission to send under your domain, corporate email, your website could send emails for lost passwords, etc. As you look at your mail related DNS settings it’s important to evaluate it in two ways: 1) Are all the platforms that could possibly send email under your domain accounted for? 2) Are there any systems that you are NOT currently using to trigger emails? Sometimes it’s easy to leave permissions in-place

DNS Analysis Reports

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Technical Content

Background & Recommendation

We leverage automated AI platforms to scan your emails for SPAM designation triggers. Sometimes simple things like multiple exclamation marks in a row, “salesy” language, or certain key words are triggers for spam bots. Additionally the type of links you include and the URLS within the email have an impact on this. It’s not necessary to have a perfect SPAM score on content but it is a metric to monitor if there are issues. Another content issue can be the links you use within your email platform. Most email platforms mask any links you place with their own link that allows them to track click through rates and then they forward people on to the address you intended them to go to. Some platforms allow you to mask these so all links are pointed directly at your domain. This isn’t critical but having your link domains match your email sending domains can have a positive impact and should be one thing that is considered to improve open rates.

Are your internal links branded?

Technical Content Analysis Reports

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Placement Test

Background & Recommendation

Placement Test Results

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Engagement Factors

Overall Engagement Factors Score for status report test

Notes

Low open rates can create a vicious cycle where email providers de-prioritize emails based on overall list behavior. If a list has low engagement it will train email providers to de-prioritize messages which further worsens open rates. To protect against this vicious cycle it’s critical to segment your audience so most of your emails are only going to the subscribers who are most engaged. This creates a positive feedback cycle that shows email providers your messages have high-engagement. We recommend primarily sending messages only to those who have opened your emails within the past 120 days. If you have low engagement it may be necessary to reduce your sends to a smaller time frame with only those who are most engaged. Hot / Warm / Cold / Frozen Strategy We recommend creating segments of your list made up of your most engaged audience members (Hot) who have interacted over the past 30 days, 90 Days (warm), and up to 120 days (cold). Those who end up in the cold category can be engaged with a re-activation sequence. If they still do not respond after a re-activation campaign we recommend being very sparing in how much communication these names receive.

Overall

Open Rate

Engaged Audience

Open Rate

Paid Customer

Open Rate

Full Analysis

Access your spreadsheet with full Engagement Factor Analysis

Access Your Data

All Engagement Factors

Engagement Best Practices

Analysis & Recommendations

Engagement Images

Segmentation

Do you send at different frequencies to different engagement levels?

Are you primarily sending emails only to people with engagement in past 120 days?

Do you have a Hot / Warm / Cold segmentation practice in place?

Do you segment your audience by key customer types?

Frequency

How often do you send to your HOT segment?

How often do you send to your WARM segment?

How often do you send to your COLD segment?

Reactivation

Do you have a reactivation strategy?

Do you run retargeting ads as part of your reactivation strategy?

What % is successfully reactivated?

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Personalization Best Practices

Analysis & Recommendation

Personalization Images

Personalization

Is the subscriber name used in emails?

Are content blocks within emails regularly personalized?

Do you have different campaigns or automations for key customer types?

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Operations

Overall Operations Score for status report test

Notes

All Operations Factors

Automations

Background & Recommendations

Automations are powerful tools but just like anything they require some oversight. We’ve seen many clients have automations that end up “out of control” where they were improperly designed and a small set of their audience was getting bombarded by emails or the wrong content which can cause high-unsubscribes and spam complaints. If you make wide use of automations it’s important to audit and evaluate them regularly to make sure they are all serving their intended purpose.

Automation Reports

Number of Automations

Are there automations that are unnecessary or causing an unusual number of unsubsor spam complaints?

Do you have clear documentation and visibility for the purpose of every automation?

Have you recently audited your automations to know if they are all necessary and performing as desired?

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Data Management

Background & Recommendation

Data Analysis Reports

Leveraging Your Data

Are you able to easily identify paying / non-paying subscribers?

Are you able to easily segment subscribers based on purchase history?

Do you know your minimum positive list growth requirement?

Subscriber Insights

Do you know your subscriber LTV?

Your Subscriber LTV is:

Are you able to calculate your subscriber value at different intervals (1 week, 30 days, 90 days, etc)?

Your dashboard should track (at least): Open rates, Unsubs, CTR, Revenue per email / subscriber, Hot / Warm / Cold segment sizes.

Your Dashboard & Reporting Includes:

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Unsubscribe Process

Background & Recommendation

Unsubscribe Process

Do you provide a preference center?

Is there a global nuclear unsub in each email?

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Subscriber Process

Analysis & Recommendations

Subscriber Process

Are you maximizing your post opt-in screen?

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Action Items:

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Your Action List

Technical Factors

Authentication

Spam Analysis

Domain Settings

IP address

DNS Settings

Technical Content

Placement

Engagement Factors

Engagement Best Practices

Personalization Best Practices

Operations

Automatiions

Data Management

Unsubscribe Process

Subscribe Process