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How Gmail’s New Inbox Is Affecting Open Rates

blog.mailchimp.com

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Re: How Gmail’s New Inbox Is Affecting Open Rates

#31

Post by stephengillie »

WestCoastJustin wrote: post #18
stephengillie wrote: post #14

What new inbox? I have seen no change for months, and I view my gmail inbox on the web daily.

There is a new inbox header [1] in Gmail, which adds tabs for your normal inbox, social, promotions, etc. [1] http://mail.google.com/mail/help/intl/en-US/features.html

Weird that I haven't seen this, but I've been using exactly this label filtering system for years -- I literally have had a "Social" label since 2008.

(I added "Financial" and "Sales" labels later)

Edit: apparently it was turned on but not displaying any tabs. In the settings gear I found "Configure Inbox" where I disabled these.

Re: How Gmail’s New Inbox Is Affecting Open Rates

#32

Post by [deleted] »

mortov wrote: post #19

I don't think this indicates a Google problem. They're lucky Google even deliver them to any tab - based on their own figures it's almost a 90% chance of their email being binned by end users (OK, not opened but that's pretty much the same thing). On systems I administer that's way above the threshold I'd consider for blacklist/auto-reject. Without trying to disparage their business, Mailchimp and associated 'service…

[deleted]

Re: How Gmail’s New Inbox Is Affecting Open Rates

#33

Post by JohnTHaller »

mortov wrote: post #19

I don't think this indicates a Google problem. They're lucky Google even deliver them to any tab - based on their own figures it's almost a 90% chance of their email being binned by end users (OK, not opened but that's pretty much the same thing). On systems I administer that's way above the threshold I'd consider for blacklist/auto-reject. Without trying to disparage their business, Mailchimp and associated 'service…

It's worth noting that the open rates only apply when an image is loaded from the remote server or the recipient clicks a trackable link (if the emailing system is setup properly). When a recipient opens and reads an email without showing the images or clicking a link, it doesn't count as an open as the sender has no way to track that.

Re: How Gmail’s New Inbox Is Affecting Open Rates

#35

Post by pisarzp »

Ricapar wrote: post #16

For some reason, this paragraph irked me more than it should have: If the subscriber has tabs but they didn’t opt to include the Promotions tab, Gmail will deliver to Primary instead. That’s good news. Other than that, we’re definitely testing the new inbox and trying to figure out how it works. My sense is that Gmail wants all marketing email to go to the Promotions tab. Even if we did find a tricky way into the Pri…

THIS! Another quote from article: "I’ve heard a lot of people asking how they can get out of the Promotions tab and into the Primary tab."

There is a reason why I enabled Promotions tab and I don't want you'r emails! If you will end up in my Primary by tricking me I will unsubscribe immediately to not see them at all!

Re: How Gmail’s New Inbox Is Affecting Open Rates

#36

Post by JohnTHaller »

josephers wrote: post #10

I used to "open" marketing emails for fractions of a second while browsing my inbox with keyboard shortcuts. I go to the next email, and if it's a marketing email, I move to the next email. But with the Promotions tab, I check the titles, and if they're not interesting, I mark them together as read without opening it. So, my reading behaviour hasn't changed even though tracking my open rate with tracking pixels will…

If you didn't have 'show remote images' on, there's no difference as it wouldn't count as an open. And it's off by default for all senders in gmail and every other worthwhile webmail provider.

Re: How Gmail’s New Inbox Is Affecting Open Rates

#37

Post by rip747 »

thrownaway2424 wrote: post #27
kzahel wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tabs feature is a godsend. It's definitely affecting my email behavior and making me a happier person. Instead of deleting individual marketing emails or sometimes trying to unsubscribe, I can now just ignore them completely!

But how much confidence do you have in the classification? I find myself polling all the tabs so I don't miss anything important. An example: my Amazon seller notifications go the the Promotions tab.

just drag the email into the primary tab and it will always put it there

Re: How Gmail’s New Inbox Is Affecting Open Rates

#38

Post by joshaidan »

My theory is that the reason for Google implementing the Promotion tab is so that they can put ads into the INBOXs of people who use desktop and mobile clients. Doing it this way won't be too intrusive to people who use the web client, which already has a place for ads to be viewed.

Re: How Gmail’s New Inbox Is Affecting Open Rates

#39

Post by dmgrow »

buro9 wrote: post #28

Will the issue of arriving in the Promotions and Updates tab affect transactional emails sent through MailChimp (and comparable competitors)? For example, if I'm sending a "Here's your password reset email" via MailChimp, will I now have to worry about it not just potentially going into spam, but also under some tab that the user may not look. I'm only really concerned about the transactional email, whilst we send li…

Thus far we have seen our transactional emails also going to Promotions, as well as our standard marketing emails.

This could be both good and bad. Bad because as you mention, the user won't see it immediately even if they requested it. Good because if the user actually uses and likes your service, they may start to take those transactional emails to their Priority inbox which could train it to also respect the marketing type e-mails as Priority as well. Again, this would only happen if the user actually likes your service.

Re: How Gmail’s New Inbox Is Affecting Open Rates

#40

Post by vwinsyee »

untog wrote: post #13

Am I the only person that had a "Promotions" filter added to their Gmail ages ago? I've also not got the new tabs, either. I'm wondering if I am in some lost zone.

I've been using the label:^smartlabel_group, label:^smartlabel_notification, and label:^smartlabel_promo filters for probably over a couple years now. I have all notifications and promos "skip inbox" and I just go check those labels a couple times a day or when I have a password reset email (which almost always goes to notification). These filters absolutely keep my inbox (which is itself split into 'regular' and 'priority') sane. Having this set up, I don't really see a reason for myself to get the tabbed interface.
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