Email Click-Through Rate: What’s Good and How to Improve

• Measure against delivered emails: Divide unique clicks by the number of delivered emails, then multiply by 100 to get your click-through rate.
• Trust clicks over opens: Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection can obscure whether an email was really opened, making clicks a more reliable sign of attention.
• Benchmark against your own performance: Comparing each email to your last 10 campaigns gives you a realistic baseline. Use industry benchmarks as a compass instead of a marketing Holy Grail.
• Test one element at a time: Change a single variable in each send, like your CTA copy or placement, so you can identify what drove the change in your click rate.

A neighborhood bakery sends an email announcing that pre-orders for Halloween-themed desserts are open. At first glance, opens look strong. But only a handful of subscribers click through to the order form, and fewer still place an order. 

Your click-through rate points to where an email might have lost its way. While email opens may tell you someone peeked through the front window (and that’s up for debate, too), your click-through rate tells you they walked through the door and picked up a menu. 

This guide will walk you through how to calculate your email click-through rate, evaluate whether you’re in a good place, and, if not, make targeted adjustments to increase it.

What is click-through rate (CTR)?

Email click-through rate (CTR) is the percentage of people who received your email (meaning it didn’t bounce) and clicked at least one link in it. When evaluating campaign performance, this is one of the clearest indicators that your email content resonated enough to inspire action. 

In Constant Contact reporting, click rate is the number of unique recipients who clicked a link divided by the number of emails delivered. Each subscriber counts toward your email CTR only once, even if they reopen your message and click more links. Think of it like tracking foot traffic: what matters is how many individual customers walked through your front door, not how many items they checked out.

How to calculate your email click-through rate

To calculate click-through rates, pull three numbers from your campaign reporting: total sends, bounces, and unique clicks. Here’s the calculation formula to use:

Click-through rate = [Unique clicks ÷ (Sends − Bounces)] × 100

Notice that this formula measures clicks against delivered emails, not the total emails sent. So, if an email bounced, the recipient won’t receive it and won’t be able to interact with it. Although bounces and poor deliverability don’t lower your CTR, they limit the number of people who get a chance to click. This is why list hygiene plays an important role in improving email marketing metrics.

Don’t rush to evaluate email performance immediately after sending, though, as your CTR can also change over time. People check their personal and work inboxes at different times. Waiting 24 to 48 hours gives you a reasonable monitoring window, helping you base your next decision on more complete data.

CTR calculation example

Say your law firm sends an update to 1,000 subscribers, and 20 messages bounce, leaving you with 980 delivered emails. Six hours after sending, you record five unique clicks. 

Using the formula, your click-through rate at the time is 5 ÷ (1,000 − 20) × 100 = 0.5%. That initial number, though low on a dashboard, could be the result of unchecked inboxes during a busy workday. 

Two days later, as more subscribers catch up on their inboxes and click your emails, you’re up to 30 unique clicks. Your new CTR is 30 ÷ 980 × 100 = 3%. Expect your rate to rise as more people see and engage with your message over the following days.

The difference between click-through rate and click-to-open rate

When two metrics both track clicks, which one deserves your focus?

Click-to-open rate (CTOR) divides unique clicks by unique opens. In contrast, click-through rate (CTR) measures unique clicks against every message delivered, giving you a read on your entire audience.

Each metric answers a distinct question. CTOR gauges how your email copy and design performed among the people who opened your campaign. CTR, on the other hand, tells you how well the entire email, from your subject line down to your call to action, encouraged clicks from everyone who received it.

Not that long ago, marketers relied on both to pinpoint bottlenecks. But Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection (MPP) changed that dynamic. Since MPP preloads tracking pixels, it can prevent senders from determining whether someone actually opened their email. That means email open rates, and the CTOR that depends on them, are less reliable than they used to be. 

But link clicks generally require a deliberate human action. This makes CTR the leading actor in your audience engagement movie. 

If you want a deeper dive into how these two metrics interact, explore our guide to open rate vs. click rate.

Why does click-through rate matter?

Clicks are a useful signal that your email marketing campaign sparked interest. 

More specifically, here’s how monitoring your click rate can help you finetune your approach:

• Measures genuine engagement: Opens may suggest your subject line or preview text caught attention, but clicks indicate your message held it. They can help you distinguish subscribers who read through your content from those who might skim previews or clear out their inboxes. 
• Brings subscribers closer to conversions: Whether your campaign goal is promoting a product line or collecting survey responses, subscribers typically have to click before they can convert. Now, if they make it to your site but don’t take the final step, it could be a hint that something’s off with your landing page or checkout flow, not your email copy. 
• Flags messaging issues: When you report high email open rates but CTR doesn’t follow, it could mean that subscribers aren’t finding what they expected once they look inside. That drop-off is your cue to revisit your layout, copy, offer, or CTA. 
• Offers insights into audience preferences: Some email marketing platforms, like Constant Contact, allow you to review clicks by specific URLs or check a heat map. Seeing which buttons, offers, or topics draw the most attention takes the guesswork out of what to feature next and gives you valuable data to enhance email personalization.

The Unity Centre, for example, discovered that their subscribers prefer text links over buttons using Constant Contact’s heat maps. They also found that readers click more in the first and third parts of their emails, so they started designing their campaigns around the sections getting the most attention.

What counts as a good email click-through rate? 

Whether your click rate is high or low depends on who you’re comparing yourself to. Your average click-through rate will vary by industry and email type. A promotional email and a monthly newsletter can drive different click rates, even from the same list. At the same time, a click rate that seems good for one type of business could be a warning sign for another.

While the all-industry average hovers around 2%, it’s only a starting point. The best course of action is to compare yourself against similar businesses. 

In Constant Contact, you’ll need to select your business industry in your account settings. The platform’s reporting pulls relevant industry averages alongside your campaign metrics, giving you an apples-to-apples comparison. If your numbers sit near or above that benchmark, your email content is hitting its mark. 

When we analyzed 37,000 high-performing Constant Contact customers, top senders averaged a 5% click rate. Still, the most meaningful email marketing benchmark to beat is your own. 

You should track your CTRs across campaigns to see if you can raise your click-through rate over time. Treat a figure like that as a long-term goal and focus on beating your rolling average across your last 5 to 10 sends. As you learn more about what your target audience likes and needs, your emails become more relevant, and your click rate tends to follow.

Elements that impact email click-through rate

The everyday choices you make with each campaign also affect your click-through rate. So, keep these elements in mind when reviewing your performance or creating your next draft. 

Subject line and preheader text

To get recipients to click a link, you need them to open your message first. Paired with your sender name, an attention-grabbing email subject line and preheader text help recipients to understand what’s inside. 

Keep in mind, though, that subject lines and preheaders also set expectations. Say they promise a seasonal discount. But upon opening, subscribers see a two-paragraph story about your next product launch and no link to claim a discount, which could make them feel deceived. 

To give your click rate the best fighting chance, the hook in your subject line must be relevant to the primary link or offer waiting inside. You should also think of your preheader as an extension of your subject line. Use it to add more context or build curiosity rather than repeating the point already made.

Like this:

Number of links

Packing an email with multiple links so everyone can find something they like is tempting. In practice, giving readers too many competing directions may backfire. When subscribers are skimming on a busy afternoon, decision fatigue sets in fast and readers often click none of the options. 

Keeping your links focused doesn’t mean you should only include one per email. But setting your priorities straight is key, so here’s what to consider: 

• Center the message around one primary goal: Decide what action matters most and place it front and center, whether that’s booking a consultation or downloading a guide.
• Prune secondary distractions: If a link doesn’t actively support the core purpose of your campaign, leave it out. You can always feature it in one of your next campaigns.

Link placement

Subscribers read on the fly, often on a phone while commuting or doing household chores. If you hide your main call to action after long blocks of text, some readers will close the email before ever scrolling down to discover it.

Where and how you present your links affect whether someone will take the next step. So, make sure to:

• Keep an early action visible: Give skimmers a chance to act right away. Placing a prominent button or link near the top ensures readers who are already interested don’t have to hunt for a way to get where they should.
• Hyperlink your images: When people see a mouthwatering photo of a dish, their first instinct is to tap it. Linking your visuals directly to the relevant page can earn you clicks you might otherwise miss. 
• Repeat your main link naturally: Offer the same link twice, such as a button up top and a contextual text link at the end, to catch both skimmers and readers who want to understand value before clicking.

This promotional email by Supersmile is a great example: it centers the message around the specific product and places the same CTA at the top and bottom to prompt action.

Email length

You don’t want to tell the whole story in your email. Its main purpose is to build enough interest to convince subscribers to click. When you show every detail directly into the inbox, readers have no reason to visit your website, and may just move on. 

Your email should feel like an invitation to the core event. So, share the highlight, then let your website or landing page handle the specifics.

There’s also a technical reason to consider email sizes. Gmail, for example, clips messages when their HTML size exceeds 102 KB. This hides the rest of the email behind an easy-to-miss “View entire message” link, potentially cutting off key information like your CTA.

Content relevance

The exact same message is highly unlikely to interest your entire list. People engage with emails that feel relevant to them, so it’s important to learn your audience’s preferences and habits and group them accordingly. 

Segmenting your audience into smaller, targeted groups lets you tailor your copy, promotions, and calls to action to what each individual reader needs. 

Here are a few ideas:

• Group contacts by customer journey stage: A new subscriber needs a welcome offer or an introductory guide, while a long-time client is more likely to click on a loyalty reward or a restock reminder.
• Target by specific interests: If your business offers multiple services, avoid pitching everything to everyone. A customer who only books seasonal lawn mowing perhaps isn’t interested in reading weekly updates about stone patios.
• Use past clicks as a compass: Pay attention to which topics your contacts engage with most. Tagging subscribers based on the links they click allows you to send follow-up content that matches their preferences.

Call to action (CTA)

Your call to action is the tipping point of your email campaign. Even if your layout is clean and your offer is relevant, weak or confusing CTA copy could stall momentum. Avoid vague labels like “Click here” that don’t tell subscribers what awaits them on the other side. Make the payoff specific with action-oriented copy, focusing on what they’ll gain by clicking, like “Book your next visit” or “Grab the template.” 

Calls to action often take the form of buttons. If you’re using this option, make sure to give them breathing room. Crowding links together invites accidental taps, especially on mobile screens. To make your buttons stand out cleanly, you can also use color contrast and surround buttons with enough whitespace. Your CTA doesn’t need to be a button, though, as you can always try a text link.

Mobile-friendly design

Most of us have read a cluttered email and struggled to click its links on a mobile device only to give up at the end. To avoid giving your subscribers that headache, every email design you create should display well on smaller screens. 

For small businesses with fewer than 10 employees, email templates rank as the most valuable feature in an email marketing platform, according to Constant Contact’s Email Trends for Ecommerce report. A mobile-responsive email template adjusts your message’s layout to fit the reader’s screen so all users can see the same polished layout.

But a responsive template isn’t enough on its own. You should keep images small to help emails load quickly. Using large buttons and readable fonts also makes it easier for recipients to tap and scan your emails. Lastly, write concise subject lines and put the most important information up front so subscribers can quickly understand what they’ll read.

Here’s an example of an easy-to-navigate email design with ample white space, readable fonts, plus large and bold CTAs:

Before scheduling any campaign, send a test version to your inbox and check it on your phone to verify that the layout reads effortlessly and every link opens as expected. 

Email send times

Plenty of keyboards have taken a beating while researching the best time to send an email. That’s because the timing of a message matters just as much as what it says. Send your campaign during the morning rush, and subscribers might swipe it away in a quick cleanup. Have it arrive when they have a moment to spare, and they may be more likely to tap through. 

When your message lands affects your click-through rate. Our study of 37,000 successful Constant Contact customers found that Sunday at 10 p.m. is the best time to send, based on open rate and click rates. 

However, the most suitable sending times always depend on your audience’s routines. A downtown restaurant catering to working professionals might see peak clicks early on a weekday morning before the commute begins, whereas a college-town coffee shop might get better results reaching students in the evening after classes wind down. 

So, test different sending days and times to see when your subscribers prefer to engage with your emails.

How to improve your email click-through rate 

Lifting click-through rates rarely requires rebuilding your entire email strategy. Usually, all it takes is small tweaks, like giving breathing room to a crowded layout or tailoring the offer to the specific segment.

Use this five-step process to identify what resonates and where there’s room for improvement:

1. Find your starting point

Dig into your email reports to track opens, clicks, conversions, and bounces for each email you send. Make sure to compare each send with both industry average and your recent campaigns.

One mistake that could send you down the wrong path is checking the dashboard an hour after hitting send and panicking over low numbers. Your click rate may continue to change over the first couple of days as more people read and click, so give each email time before you judge it. 

2. Pick one element to test

Look back at the elements we covered above and pick the one you suspect is affecting your click-through rate. Poor CTA placement is a common mistake, meaning a button buried at the bottom or a link that doesn’t stand out against the background. Another is ineffective segmentation, since an offer that doesn’t match the reader’s needs or behavior won’t get clicks.

Whatever you decide to tackle, stick to one element for each test. If you move the button elsewhere and trim two paragraphs of copy at once, you won’t know which tweak was behind the boost. Keeping the rest of your email unchanged helps you identify what influenced the results.

3. Run an A/B test

Instead of guessing what drives results, let subscribers choose. Email A/B testing lets you set up two versions of the same email and compare them against each other. You change one component, such as the color of your CTA button, and send version A to one audience group and version B to another. Once the results are in, it’s time to send the winning version to the rest of your email list.

A/B testing helps you experiment with new layouts or copy and identify which version gets more clicks before rolling it out to your wider audience.

4. See which links drove clicks

Once you’ve given the test a couple of days to collect data, don’t stop at the overall click rate. Check the breakdown to figure out which specific topics or offers attracted the most clicks. If your email marketing tool lets you access click maps, these will give you a visual view of where people tapped inside your email. 

Both options are available through Constant Contact’s email tracking software, allowing you to spot patterns at a glance. If an inline text link at the top outperforms the prominent button at the bottom, you can see which way the wind blows.

5. Keep the winner and test again

Make the winning version your new standard for future sends. Then, move on to the next element on your list, whether that means making your subject lines more descriptive or sending your campaigns at a different time.

Raising your click rate is rarely about a single dramatic change. Focus on making small improvements, tracking the results, and building on what works.

Get more clicks from every email

A high click-through rate comes from respecting subscribers’ attention rather than tricking them into tapping a link. When you remove clutter, speak to your readers’ needs, and make next steps effortless, you give them more reasons to click.

Before sending your next campaign, take 10 seconds to read it through your subscriber’s eyes. Is the benefit immediately clear? Do they have a specific path to get what you promised? If the answer is yes, it’s time to send it.

Ready to see exactly where your readers tap and compare your results with industry benchmarks? Start your free 30-day trial of Constant Contact to start tracking the right metrics and making more informed decisions about your emails.

FAQs

1. What is considered a decent email click-through rate?

A 2% click-through rate sits right around the 2.03% all-industry average from Constant Contact’s statistics roundup. Whether it’s good for you depends on how your results compare with your industry benchmark and recent campaigns. Also, clicks don’t live in a bubble, so keep checking whether they lead to sales or sign-ups, too.

2. Why is my click-through rate high but my sales are low?

A high click-through rate with a low conversion rate usually means the issue lies after the click. Check that your landing page matches the offer in your email and that the next step is easy. If people click a seasonal promo link and land on a homepage where that offer isn’t prominently displayed, they may leave without giving it a second thought.

3. Does Apple Mail Privacy Protection affect click-through rates?

Apple Mail Privacy Protection mainly affects open tracking, which is why clicks can be a more reliable metric to monitor. Apple clarifies that the feature obscures whether people opened an email, but link clicks are tracked separately. Judge open rate and click-to-open rate with that limitation in mind, and use click-through rate for a clearer picture of subscriber engagement.