CTOR: what mesures?

Category: Email Marketing

The most used metric to evaluate the results of a campaign are the openings and our 2021 email marketing report puts the clicks in second place. But there is a data that combines both and that help us to know how much interest has been shown: the CTOR or Click to Open Rate (also called Click Through Open Rate).

Let's start with the definitions to clarify the concepts:

• Open Rate is the percentage of subscribers who have opened our email compared to the total number of emails delivered. It depends mainly on the subject, but also on the sender or the time of sending. It is useful to know the engagement of the list with the brand.
  Formula: unique opens / delivered x 100.
  For example: if we send 1000 mailings and 250 unique users open them, the open rate is 25%.
   
• Click Through Rate (CTR) is the percentage of clicks that the message has achieved considering all the links (text, images, buttons...). It depends on the interest they have in the subject and the persuasiveness of the content. It helps to know if the objective has been achieved (derive traffic, add conversions...), i.e. if the calls to action have worked because users have completed the desired action.
  Formula: unique clicks / delivered x 100.
  For example: if we continue with 1000 deliveries and get 100 unique clicks, the click-through rate is 10%.
   
• Click Through Open Rate (CTOR) is the percentage of clicks (CTR) made only by subscribers who have opened the message. Combining both data, depends on both the subject and the content, so it serves to assess the general interest aroused by the mailings. Unlike CTR, which takes into account everyone who received the message, CTOR only looks at those who opened the message, so it measures more accurately the results and whether the calls to action worked.
  Formula: unique clicks / unique opens x 100.
  For example: following the same, it would be 100 unique clicks out of 250 unique opens, so 40%.

Here is a summary table of the example:

Each data has a function, but the CTOR is the most complete metric and that is why it is a good practice to look at it to optimize the results of our email marketing.

 

How to improve CTOR?

The CTOR will always be higher than the Open rate and CTR, but a good percentage can be around 20-30%. To increase your click-through rate after opening, the easiest thing to do is to apply tactics to increase click-throughs. For example:

• Write the subject line with the content in mind, without misleading people about what they will find when they open it.
• Apply the rule of 1 to focus the message on a single objective that leads to a specific action.
• Personalise content so that each user segment sees only what is most interesting to them.
• Use copywriting as a persuasive technique so that subscribers are clear on what to do.
• Make it easy to click with a design that highlights links, such as news headlines, product images or buttons, depending on the type of mailing.

In the long term, as CTOR stabilises, you will also want to increase open rates because, after all, the two are related and should be balanced. So optimise the subject line and make it persuasive, for example by including the recipient's name, adding an emoji to make it stand out or using the pre-header to draw even more attention.

Email marketing allows for many approaches to measurement to get the most out of your mailings: you have more metrics in our statistics guide.

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