Drop in Open Rates and CTR Since Q1 2024

[MarlaM3y]

Has anyone else experienced a decline in open and click-through rates since Q1? We moved from Pardot to HubSpot earlier this year, and our metrics were stable at first. However, since launching our initial HubSpot campaign in February, both OR and CTR have significantly dropped.

We tried switching to a dedicated IP, then removed it on the advice of our HubSpot Account Manager, but there was no change. Recently, I split-tested an email in Constant Contact, where the CTR was around 2%, compared to just 0.04% in HubSpot. I noticed that many clicks in Constant Contact came from subscribers who clicked every link, including the logo, which seemed like bot activity.

Has HubSpot's reporting changed to filter out these types of clicks? I don’t see enough bot exclusions in HubSpot’s reporting to explain the drop. I plan to test an email on both platforms with a link to a form. If form fills are consistent but clicks still vary, it may point to reporting differences rather than an actual decline in engagement.

Would appreciate any insights or similar experiences!

[ScottPennwood · Accepted solution]

Hey @MarlaM3y,

You're not alone! A lot of email marketers are having this problem, and there's a fair bit of advice out there, especially in those posts that @BérangèreL has linked.

A couple of things I'd like to add to the conversation:

• It looks like Gmail updated their Promotions algorithm in Q1 of 2024. You may have users that are Gmail users (or using Google Workspace), and much like we had to adapt to the Apple update a couple of years ago, it's never simple to work out how to get around changes like this. Some marketers have found success with:
  • Split-sending, or batch-sending
    
    • And in fact if we dig further down to our HubSpot roots, there's a strong argument for creating send-lists by persona and massively changing up the content of the emails
  • Reducing the number of images in the email
  • Changing up the From/Alias, as well as experimenting with the subject line
  • Reducing the number of links in the body 
• It sounds like you're 100% right with the Constant Contact bot activity. I once worked with someone who embedded a tiny, single-dot link in the same colour as the footer background which she called the "Bot Link". A human wouldn't see or notice it, but bots clicked it. She then removed these from the reports to show true numbers. Such a simple idea, I wish I'd come up with it! If you're testing other platforms and you're unsure as to how they deal with bot clicks, this is a sure-fire way to filter that out.
  • But remember, some email security platforms click all links before delivering to the sender, so to measure success what you're actually looking for is a user that clicked all the links once, and then clicked another one(s). My money is on the HubSpot stats. 

If you manage to find success in improving your numbers, please do share what worked for you! 

[danmoyle · Accepted solution]

Hey there @MarlaM3y and welcome to the Community! In addition to what @ScottPennwood offered, and the solutions listed from @BérangèreL, I also found this interesting perspective. I wonder if maybe it's also a factor? 

HubSpot has implemented bot filtering for email analytics, which could explain some of the discrepancies you're seeing. Since the change, it automatically detects and excludes suspected bot activity from email performance data by default. 

While it's good because this filtering helps provide a more reliable view of human interaction with your emails, it can also negatively affect analytics.

Bot activity includes triggers from privacy filters like Apple's Mail Privacy Protection and corporate screeners like Mimecast. The significant difference in CTR between Constant Contact (2%) and HubSpot (0.04%) could be partially attributed to HubSpot's more aggressive bot filtering.

I did read that HubSpot has been working on improving their bot detection. The product team announced they were revamping their bot detection software, with plans to release updates. If you have bot filtering enabled in your account, you may see additional traffic being filtered from your reporting.

One way to investigate and maybe help is to check your HubSpot account's bot filtering settings to ensure they're configured correctly. Hope this helps a bit, too. 

[MarlaM3y]

Thanks @danmoyle. I wish I could point to the bot filtering update but the metrics are down significantly whether bot filtering is on or off per my comment to @ScottPennwood above. Although, it's clear from a test I did today that HubSpot is more aggressively filtering bots whether or not the bot feature is turned on. I think I'll take a look at those first couple of HubSpot emails with high click through from earlier this year to see if there was a higher percentage of cases where all links were clicked. Maybe that would give me a better sense of whether recent metrics are more accurate representations of genuine engagement, rather than a downturn in email effectiveness.

The goal is to demonstrate that these metrics represent an update in HubSpot’s reporting logic rather than a decline in our email campaign performance since migrating to HubSpot.

[ScottPennwood · Accepted solution]

Hey @MarlaM3y,

You're not alone! A lot of email marketers are having this problem, and there's a fair bit of advice out there, especially in those posts that @BérangèreL has linked.

A couple of things I'd like to add to the conversation:

• It looks like Gmail updated their Promotions algorithm in Q1 of 2024. You may have users that are Gmail users (or using Google Workspace), and much like we had to adapt to the Apple update a couple of years ago, it's never simple to work out how to get around changes like this. Some marketers have found success with:
  • Split-sending, or batch-sending
    
    • And in fact if we dig further down to our HubSpot roots, there's a strong argument for creating send-lists by persona and massively changing up the content of the emails
  • Reducing the number of images in the email
  • Changing up the From/Alias, as well as experimenting with the subject line
  • Reducing the number of links in the body 
• It sounds like you're 100% right with the Constant Contact bot activity. I once worked with someone who embedded a tiny, single-dot link in the same colour as the footer background which she called the "Bot Link". A human wouldn't see or notice it, but bots clicked it. She then removed these from the reports to show true numbers. Such a simple idea, I wish I'd come up with it! If you're testing other platforms and you're unsure as to how they deal with bot clicks, this is a sure-fire way to filter that out.
  • But remember, some email security platforms click all links before delivering to the sender, so to measure success what you're actually looking for is a user that clicked all the links once, and then clicked another one(s). My money is on the HubSpot stats. 

If you manage to find success in improving your numbers, please do share what worked for you! 

[MarlaM3y]

Thanks for your insight. Our B2C team, primarily Gmail users, hasn’t encountered this issue, so I’m unsure if Gmail's algorithm is to blame. In B2B (my side), where most subscribers use Outlook, I wonder if recent Outlook updates are impacting HubSpot’s metrics.

I tested HubSpot and Constant Contact (using the "dot strategy") with bot filtering off. Results showed 55% of HubSpot clickers engaged with the hidden dot, compared to 96% for Constant Contact, suggesting HubSpot may filter bots more aggressively than other ESPs.

It’s unclear why my metrics have dropped significantly, regardless of bot filtering. It feels like clicks are suppressed beyond what reporting shows, even with bot filtering off. Could there be recent updates to click tracking affecting metrics?

Today’s email included a landing page link. So far, the only form submission came from a Constant Contact subscriber who also clicked the bot link, supporting your point on engaging users who clicked more than all links.

[BérangèreL]

Hi @MarlaM3y and welcome to the Community!
We are delighted to have you here!

Thanks for asking the Community!

First, for information, I'd like to share this article "Understand bot filtering in marketing email analytics".

Also, here are similar threads that might help you:

- The solution from @Jnix284 on this post "Open rates on our Email Campaigns have significantly dropped"
- The solution from @danmoyle on this post "Open Rates and Clicks have dropped significantly since March"
- The solution from @CHawkins on this post "Significant Drop in Email Click-through"

I'd love to put you in touch with some other Top Experts who might want to add some additional insights/tips: Hi @ScottPennwood, @Phil_Vallender and @FazleRabbihx do you have other suggestions to help @MarlaM3y, please?

Thanks so much and have a wonderful weekend!

Best,
Bérangère

[MarlaM3y]

Thanks, I'll take a look!