Is this a responsive list?

I quoted the study to show that open rates vary by
list size, not to give definitive figures on what open
rates should be.

Here's some more research by MailChimp which gives
much lower average open rate figures from their users:

Email Marketing Stats, Benchmarks and Research | MailChimp (no affil.)

Whether the open rate figures are low or high isn't the
point - we need to compare apples with apples.

I'm only mildly interested in how MY open rates vary
over time for MY lists, using MY autoresponder system
with MY messages.

However, open rate metrics have decreased in recent
years - partially due to more and more e-mail clients
blocking the open rate tracking pixels by default.

And - yes - it's getting harder and harder for average
e-mail marketers to get and keep their subscriber's
attention and convert that into action and money.

That's why it's important to continually sharpen your
e-mail marketing saw so you've got the best tools in
your box.

Dedicated to mutual success,

Shaun

Open rates don't decline over time, but certain practices lose their efficiency. Tricky headlines, bait and switch tactics, and other things marketers love is what makes the average open rate to decline over time. (Among other things Shaun points out.)

40% open rates means 6 people out of 10 are ignoring your emails. Further more, 4 are opening your email, but that doesn't mean they read it, or read it completely. OP says that the click-through rates are 42 percent, so that means less than 2 people out of those 4 who open your emails bother to click the links.

So you don't have a list of 1,000 people, but one of 200. The rest are virtual corpses. That means you're paying for 800 subscribers who don't earn you anything.

I'm sorry, but that doesn't seem like a good statistic.

L.E.: I've heard that Google is working at some algorithm that will detect your level of engagement with the emails you are receiving. So if you're consistently ignoring emails from a person, or open and don't read them, Google might flag those emails as useless and you won't even make it in the inbox in the future. So people with 12% open rates will have a hard time earning their bread in the future.

Two things...

> Shaun has it right. Opens, clicks, etc. are a stepping stone. You'll know how responsive your list really is when you measure the revenue per subscriber. People like to say that a list should earn $1/subscriber/month. I say most of those people would wet their drawers in joy if they hit that target. I also know people who would consider that a serious pay cut. It's not a 'should' number, it's just a benchmark to aim for. What you can earn depends on you - if you hit that magic benchmark, pat yourself on the back and set a new one.

> Maecenas23, those numbers in your OP are neither good nor bad. They simply are. They're what you measured for a new list. Those numbers are now your baseline for this list, something to measure your testing against. You are planning to test various elements, aren't you?