System Best Practices for Email and Mobile

First, let's talk about deliverability. Maintaining a healthy sender reputation is crucial to be sure mail is inboxing. Embracing best practices and actively monitoring key metrics are both essential, especially during the busy holiday season.

Metrics to Track

Key metrics to monitor:

  • Deliverability rate: Any dip in deliverability rate is something that should be investigated whether it is specific to Hard Bounces or Soft Bounces.
  • Hard Bounces:Any increase in Hard Bounces is an indicator of list hygiene issues that are likely to negatively impact your sender reputation.
  • Soft Bounces: Any significant increase in Soft Bounces is likely due to an ISP block due to behavior the ISPs sees as abusive.
  • Open rates:Any significant dip in open rates is usually an indicator of inbox placement issues. Especially if 1) list size has not changed and 2) the dip is specific to an ISP in particular. While opens can be overinflated due to non-human interactions (NHIs), they should still be used to look at directionally.
  • Complaint rates:Increased complaint rates are indicative of unwanted mail and a large driver of decreased sender reputation. Gmail and Yahoo both require complaint rates to be below 0.3%. Mailstreams with a complaint rate above 0.3% will be subject to inboxing issues.

Tip: You can view all these email metrics in the Email Summary report.

Deliverability

Here are a few steps to take to ensure your deliverability remains consistent throughout the holiday season.

  • Do not introduce any new lists that are not currently being mailed to.
  • Do not reactivate old lists or mail to older lists you have not consistently mailed to.
  • Do not fully remove suppression lists. If you want to begin sending to less engaged users, slowly begin well before the holiday season starts. That way, issues can be mitigated before Black Friday.
  • Be cautious of new acquisition sources. Test them prior to the holiday season and ensure they don’t result in hard bounces and complaints.
  • Be careful changing your sending cadence. ISPs will penalize you for an inconsistent spike in send volume, so increases in cadence should happen slowly. Provide preferences to allow users to opt down from increased marketing.
  • Do not change your sending domain.

Check out our Guide to Email Deliverability for more information.

Channel Best Practices

Each sending channel requires different best practices to optimize your sender reputation.

Email Messaging - Timing

Your send time is almost as important as your content to ensure good engagement. 

  • Send off the hour at 11:10 or 1:36, for example. You'll avoid the rush and get to the top of the inbox. 
  • Use Personalized Send Time to reach users at optimal hours unless your offer is time-limited. 
  • Send in users' local time zones for maximum engagement. 
  • Use Campaigns for messaging that needs to be scheduled for a specific time.

Lifecycle Optimizer

Start testing new Lifecycle Optimizer flows now (in advance of holiday sends) to confirm expected behavior. Ensure your Transactional templates are set as "transactional". Avoid using Lifecycle Optimizer for emails that need to go out at specific times.

Mobile

Ensure your mobile apps are up-to-date and ready for the holiday season. 

  • Update to the latest SDK to ensure compatibility with the latest devices.
  • Push early to the App Store to avoid delays close to holidays. 
  • Promote in-app purchases as customers often receive credits as gifts. 
  • Use emojis in your push notifications--they're shown to improve engagement rates. 

  You can always check the status page by visiting status.sailthru.com. Make sure to click "Subscribe to Sailthru" to receive important status updates in real-time via email or text.