This is quite a bit of information, but I highly suggest our Solutions Agents who use email marketing give it a good read-over.
It’s everywhere – If you haven’t seen it yet, Apple is changing the way they accept and filter email marketing, come this Fall. You may see a drop in Open Rates. Don’t panic, you’re still relevant and your fabulous customers aren’t ignoring you, analytics tracking just may be less on your side than before. But don’t fret, let’s talk about workarounds and what we can do now to prepare. First, what is this new iOS 15 and why am I urging you to change habits now?
Why is this even worth reading this long, drawn out post for in the first place? Did you know that the majority of those clients you send your newsletter, your new listing or bulk listing collections to use their mobile device to access the sent content? While Android holds a huge share of the mobile phone market, Apple is still in over 1/2 of all user’s hands.
What’s Being Publicized to Apple Users:
• The ability to hide your IP and turn off tracking – When you send your email out through a provider like Mailchimp or Constant Contact, invisible pixel trackers help report analytics back to you. Apple’s new features basically allow these to be blocked. This is going to hinder your capacity to gather open rates, see the location of the open, etc. If your client turns privacy features on, you won’t be able to track their specific link clicks or whether or not they’re even looking at your emails, however, you still should be able to obtain a general view of how many individuals clicked on each link plus those who don’t have the feature enabled will report regular metrics. This stunts your analytics some, but not entirely.
• It will become readily known that users can hide their email – (Already available, but how many people knew this? Unless you enjoy tech, like your resident nerd in Suntree, or were specifically searching privacy options, this information isn’t readily available, but it will be).
A lot of these options are available with the new 14 iOS update, but less than 5% of users knew. With the iOS 15 rollout, you’re looking at a more publicized campaign from Apple, with them showing they’re dedication to user privacy. The chances are higher for your clients to enable these features.
Key Campaigns Will Be Affected:
• Re-Engagement: If you have built campaigns that are centered and automated around your customer’s open rate, these are going to need tweaking and a little manual labor/love.
• Segmentation: This is one thing I use a lot and promote to my digital newsletter clients. Segmentation automatically puts a client into a list, based off of what they open, then I suggest a workup of content that is built upon their likes and what interests them, leading to better open rates and a customer more likely to actually engage with your emails. With the inability to track some customers, you will most likely have the tweak this feature a bit as well.
No Panicking – Email Marketing Will Still Be Effective – Take Steps Now:
With the rollout of the new iOS happening sometime this Fall, you have time to play with analytics NOW. Find a strategy that works and run with it.
• Use AB Testing. What is AB Testing? It’s sending the same email out in variations. Example: Test A has a short subject line with a fun emoji and longer preview text while Test B has a longer subject line and to the point preview text. Now…which has more link clicks? A higher open rate? More calls? The point is to figure out which one your audience prefers and use that when these new privacy features come available.
• Don’t focus solely on Open Rates – Focus on articles, content and landing pages that receive clicks. These are going to be the new metrics to use as your foundation and are really even better at presenting you with the analytics of what works. If not one single person cared about an article, it’s probably for the best that you nix a similar or duplicate in the near future.
• Use these new settings to up your game. Don’t let a dip in Open Rates stop you from pursuing email advertising. It’s still useful and important in staying relevant amongst your clientele and for gaining lead conversions. Use this as a stepping stone to kick it up a notch and really out-do yourself instead of just throwing something together. (No judgment, we all do it. Life just happens sometimes.)
Adapt, evolve and improve, friends. We’ve got this 🙌🏻.
If you have any questions about this or need help leveling up your digital marketing strategy, you know where to find me ❤✌🏻 -Laura S.
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