Brief Summary

Apple released Mail Privacy Protection as part of their recent iOS 15 and Mac OS upgrade. Once Apple Mail users upgrade they will be able to make a choice - Protect Mail Activity or not. If mail activity is protected, open rates on Apple Mail will no longer be reliable.

Mail Privacy Protection is available with Apple Mail on mobile devices (iOS 15) and desktop (Mac OS). This includes non-Apple email addresses (like Gmail or Outlook) when used with Apple Mail.

It's important to note, this example highlights Apple Mail but some other email clients already have a similiar approach, and those that don't will likely follow the trend soon.

How does it technically work?

Today, open rates are tracked by a single-pixel image hidden within an email. When an email is opened and the image is downloaded, Marketing Cloud calculates an open. With the new Mail Privacy Protection enabled, images will be downloaded upon delivery. That means Marketing Cloud will calculate an open when a message is delivered, rather than when it is opened.

An email "bot click" occurs when a click on a hyperlink within an email is generated by an automated program, often referred to as a "bot" or "web crawler," rather than by a human recipient. Many email clients are moving to this model creating artificially inflated open rates.

Spam Filters and Inflated Engagement Rates

Spam filters may cause an increase in unique open rates through system-generated opens. Spam filters have become increasingly sophisticated over time, and bots now check links within incoming emails before allowing them into the recipient's inbox. The bot opens the email to access the links it wants to check. If you have a send with high open rates (>90%) with recipients all having the same or similar open times, spam filters are likely the cause. In addition to inflated open rates, inflated click metrics could also be attributed to bot clicks. This article from Braze covers what you need to know about bot clicks and how to spot them.

Although spam filters can work in different ways, they typically examine sending reputation, email content, and recipient engagement when determining if a message is spam. Learn more about how spam filters work.

Currently, there are no technical solutions that allow Marketing Cloud tracking systems to confirm if the Opens or Clicks are human or system-generated. Learn more about how to filter anti-spam software opens from Marketing Cloud tracking data. This article contains the query you can run to analyze Open times. You will need to modify line 16 of the query to account for Opens instead of Clicks, depending on the use case.

Re-think key performance metrics (KPIs)

Take Open Rates For What They Are

For years, open data usefulness has been debated and could already be considered unreliable for numerous reasons. It's difficult to create a strategic plan for recipients who are all indicated as opened (or not opened), given the variety in those interaction. For example:

• An open is not counted when images aren't downloaded, giving a false negative.
• Someone who accidentally opens an email is tracked as an open, essentially giving a false positive.
• Someone could open the email and get annoyed/offended or love the content; both would be tracked the same.
• Some email clients mark all emails received as opened, regardless of how the recipient engages (creating artificially inflated open rates).
• Some email clients will never mark emails as opened, even when a recipient opens the email (creating artificially deflated open rates).

Take Click Rates for What They Are

• Some email clients mark all links within an email as clicked, regardless of how the recipient engages (creating artificially inflated click rates).
• Some email clients will never mark email links as clicked, even when a recipient clicks the email (creating artificially deflated click rates).

Focus on Another Action

Focus on a further action the recipient takes, such as registering for an event, subscribing to a newsletter, or web traffic analytics.