Friday, 26th Sep, 2025

by John Bellingham

Email Marketing Tip

Stop chasing email open rates…

For years, open rates were the go-to metric for most email marketers. Even now, I get asked every week – “What’s a good open rate?“.

But here’s the truth: open rates don’t tell the full story anymore.

Between Apple’s email privacy protection and bots (i.e. the corporate IT police!) auto-opening links, your “open” data is fuzzy at best.

You might think more people are reading your emails than actually are.

So what metric should you focus on instead?

Replies 😊

Why Replies Matter

  • Replies show real human engagement – nobody ever replies by accident.
  • Email platforms (like Apple, Yahoo, Gmail etc.) see replies as a positive signal, improving your email deliverability rates.
  • Replies start conversations that can turn into sales, collaborations, or valuable feedback.

How to Encourage Replies

Ask one simple question at the end of your email.
For example: “What’s the biggest challenge you’re facing with [your relevant topic] right now?”

Make it personal.
Write as if you’re talking to one subscriber, not blasting a generic list.

Acknowledge responses.
Even a short “Thanks for sharing” keeps the loop alive.

The Bottom Line

Open rates can be misleading, replies can’t!

If you want to measure true engagement and build stronger relationships with your subscribers, shift your focus from opens to conversations.

💡 Pro Tip: Add a single, low-barrier question to your next email. You might be pleasantly surprised how many subscribers are willing to hit the ‘reply’ button when you invite them to.

Kit Feature

Resend to ‘unopens’.

No matter how good your subject line (and preview text) is, not everyone will open your email the first time.

People get busy. Inboxes get crowded.

That’s where Kit’s Resend to Unopens feature comes in.

Why Resends Work

  • Gives your email a second chance to be seen.
  • Reach subscribers who wanted to read it, but missed it (for any reason).
  • You can test a different subject line or send time for better engagement.

How to Do It in Kit

  1. After sending your broadcast, click the 3 dots.
  2. Click Resend to Unopens.
  3. Change the subject line (optional, but highly recommended).
  4. Set the resend to go out after 1–3 days.

Tips for Better Results

  • Tweak the subject line: Try a new angle, question, or benefit.
  • Don’t resend too soon: Give people at least 24-48 hours.
  • Don’t overdo it: One resend is plenty. More can feel pushy.

The Bottom Line

Resending to unopens is a simple way to increase your reach without creating new content.

It’s not about spamming, it’s about giving people who wanted to hear from you a second chance.

Here’s how to use the ‘resend’ feature in Kit

Tech Tip

10X your typing speed! (okay, not really your typing speed…your creation speed!)

Do you find yourself repeatedly typing the same blocks of content, or saving them to a Word document somewhere so you can copy and paste it?

Save yourself the heartache… 💔

TextExpander is a game-changing little tool when it comes to crafting content you share regularly.

I’ll give you some examples that I use it for… (i.e. for answers to common questions)

  • “How do I grow my email list?”
  • “My emails are landing in spam – how can I stop this?”
  • “I’ve never used email marketing – where should I start?”

You get the gist… things people often ask – you’ll have your own list of commonly asked questions from your audience.

By typing just a few letters, you can paste an entire clock of content into your email (or document) in an instant!

Below is a screenshot of just one example of how I use it; the circled abbreviation is “l:deliv“, and any time I type that short snippet, it replaces it with a fully formatted, rich text bulleted list that you can see on the right-hand side (in the red box).

Once you start using it, you’ll begin to come up with ideas of how to use it in ways you can’t think of right now.

I created an entire library of business mini-bios and created shortcuts for each – e.g. if I make reference to a business, I can just type in ‘bio:star‘ (for Starbucks) and the complete article is pasted into the page.

Although it’s not free, it’s very low cost – just $4/m… and yet, it saves me so much time!

If you want to give it a go, click the link is below.

Want helpful video tutorials on Kit?

Subscribe to my YouTube channel, it’s free and easy to do!

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John Bellingham
John Bellingham
Articles: 118