If you're sending customers emails or messages, you've likely noticed a metric called an open rate. This metric is individual to each communication you send customers. Open rates are essential to understanding what messaging resonates with your audience.
What is an open rate?
An open rate is the percentage of people who have opened an email or message sent to them. The higher an open rate is, the more people have opened your message. Average open rates can vary depending on the channel you use to message your audience. For example, email, Facebook Messenger or SMS.
What is a good open rate?
The higher an open rate is, the more likely your message will convert people to follow your desired call-to-action.
Average open rates vary by the channel.
Email: The average open rate for email is 21.33%.
Facebook Messenger: The average open rate for Facebook Messenger is 80%.
SMS or Text: The average open rate for SMS is 95%.
How is an open rate calculated?
Each message sent to an audience has a different open rate. First, take the number of opened messages and divide it by the amount sent. This will result in a decimal number for your open rate percentage. Next, multiplying the decimal result by 100 will give you the percentage of people who opened your message.
[Number of opened messages ÷ Number of messages sent ] x 100 = % of Emails/Messages Opened or Open Rate
If you have access to the number of bounced emails or text messages, you will be able to calculate a more accurate open rate by including those which bounced. This will result in the percentage of people who opened your email or text compared to the total who received it.
[Number of opened emails ÷ (Number of emails sent - bounced emails)] x 100 = % of Emails/Messages Opened or Open Rate
Why is it important to increase your open rates?
Ensuring high email deliverability is one thing, but the higher your open rate is the more people will see the message you're sending them. With an increase number of people reading your message, the more people will click-through on your message. When someone clicks on your call-to-action it is known as a click-through rate (CTR). This can be anything such as a shopping link, a video, or a link to another site.
How do you increase your open rates?
The fastest way to increase your open rate on communications is to start using channels with traditionally higher open rates. Use Facebook Messenger or SMS to send messages with 80-95% open rates. Different messages resonate over different channels, however the best way to increase open rates is to use the most effective channels for your message.
For example, if you're running a Black Friday Cyber Monday sale with urgent timing, a 95% open rate with an SMS message can make all the difference to revenue generated from the message.
When using a mix of channels, you can start to test your messaging on each channel to find what works for you.
Get Started Today
You can get started with Facebook Messenger or SMS (80-95% open rates) today:
- Download Octane AI with your 14-day free trial
- Set up your Octane AI account
- Use the Octane AI playbook to set up and optimize your Messenger and SMS strategy.
