What are the implications of Verizon Media's approach to email tracking and data access?
Matthew Whittaker
Co-founder & CTO, Suped
Published 28 Apr 2025
Updated 15 Aug 2025
8 min read
The landscape of email marketing is constantly evolving, with a significant shift towards greater privacy for users. This change directly impacts how email marketers approach engagement tracking and data access. Over the past few years, there has been a noticeable movement among major mailbox providers to limit traditional tracking methods, aiming to give users more control over their personal data.
Verizon Media, now part of Yahoo, has been a key player in this transition, openly expressing a stance against tracking email users. This position, articulated through their postmaster channels, has spurred conversations across the industry. It challenges the long-standing reliance on conventional metrics like open rates, pushing marketers to rethink their strategies for understanding recipient engagement and deliverability.
The privacy-first approach and its challenges
Verizon Media (Yahoo) has made its position clear: it believes that tracking email users is wrong. This conviction has driven them to implement policies and features that prioritize user privacy over granular sender tracking. This approach stands in contrast to previous industry norms, where pixel-based tracking for opens and clicks was standard practice for measuring campaign performance.
One notable initiative reflecting this privacy-first stance is View Time Optimization (VTO). VTO aims to deliver emails to users at the optimal time they are most likely to engage, rather than strictly based on the order of arrival. My colleague inquired about this, asking, "Are they saying, 'We will put things in the inbox in a different order than when they were actually delivered, based on what we think is best for the user?'" This highlights a critical implication: inbox placement and order are increasingly determined by the mailbox provider’s algorithms, not just the sender’s timing. While beneficial for the user experience, it complicates traditional email campaign analysis.
This privacy-centric shift is not unique to Verizon Media (Yahoo). We've seen similar movements across the industry. Google’s phasing out of third-party cookies, and Apple Mail Privacy Protection (MPP) are prime examples, reinforcing a broader industry trend towards reduced tracking. This means that email marketers must increasingly rely on other signals to gauge the effectiveness of their campaigns, moving away from pixel-based data. It forces a fundamental change in how internet service providers track email engagement and its subsequent impact on deliverability.
The role of data feeds and their accessibility
Given their stance against traditional tracking, Verizon Media (Yahoo) has pivoted to offering performance feeds as an alternative. These feeds provide aggregate, anonymized data on email performance, allowing senders to understand general trends without compromising individual user privacy. The idea is that marketers can still optimize campaigns based on overall engagement metrics, even if they don't have access to specific user-level actions.
However, the accessibility and cost of these data feeds have been a point of discussion within the email community. Initially, it seemed these feeds were primarily available to larger Email Service Providers (ESPs) or platforms, making it a potentially expensive pay-to-play model. This raises concerns about smaller senders being left in the dark, unable to access the same level of insight. While Mailgun announced a partnership for VTO, the broader access to data feeds remained a question for many.
Unlike free tools such as Google Postmaster Tools or Microsoft's Smart Network Data Services (SNDS), Verizon Media's (Yahoo's) data feeds came with a significant price tag. This cost barrier means that comprehensive insights into how emails perform within the Verizon Media ecosystem are not universally accessible. For many marketers, this presents a challenge in maintaining a full view of their deliverability across all major mailbox providers, especially when they need to understand the usefulness of Verizon Media’s engagement feeds.
Understanding Verizon Media's (Yahoo's) Data Feeds
Verizon Media's (Yahoo's) data feeds offer senders anonymized, aggregated insights into how their emails are performing within their ecosystem. These feeds represent a move away from individual user tracking, providing a privacy-compliant way for marketers to assess email effectiveness. They can include data points like engagement rates, spam complaints, and overall deliverability trends.
While the feeds do not provide granular, per-user tracking data, they allow large-volume senders and ESPs to gain a high-level understanding of their email program's health and identify potential issues that might affect deliverability. This information is crucial for optimizing sending practices and maintaining a positive sender reputation with Verizon Media (Yahoo) domains.
Impact on deliverability and sender strategy
The implications for deliverability are profound. Without direct access to traditional open and click data, email marketers must shift their focus to building and maintaining a strong sender reputation through other means. Mailbox providers like Verizon Media (Yahoo) increasingly rely on various signals, including authentication, spam complaints, direct engagement, and list quality, to determine inbox placement. This means that a healthy, engaged subscriber list becomes even more critical for successful email delivery. This is why it's crucial to understand how Yahoo data has changed for email marketers.
The emphasis on VTO also indicates that content relevance and user satisfaction are paramount. If an email is deemed relevant and engaging, it stands a better chance of being delivered at an optimal time. This moves marketers away from a purely volume-based sending strategy towards a quality-centric one, where every email sent needs to provide value to the recipient. This echoes the sentiment behind the Google and Yahoo 2024 email sending changes, which further emphasize authenticated, wanted mail.
Ultimately, senders must adapt by prioritizing authentic engagement and list health. Metrics like open rates become less reliable, while overall inbox placement, spam complaint rates, and direct user interactions (like replies or moving emails to the primary inbox) gain more importance. This requires a shift in how marketers define success and how they allocate their resources for email program management. Marketers will need to find new ways to track positive engagement without relying on direct outbound clicks.
Traditional tracking (pre-2020s)
Metrics relied upon: Primarily open rates (via tracking pixels) and click-through rates for granular performance.
Data granularity: Individual user-level data, allowing for detailed segmentation and personalization.
Deliverability signals: Heavy reliance on observed opens and clicks to gauge engagement and sender reputation.
Privacy-focused approach (post-2020s)
Metrics relied upon: Aggregate engagement from data feeds, View Time Optimization (VTO), and overall sender reputation.
Data granularity: Anonymized, high-level data; focus shifts to list health and content relevance.
Deliverability signals: Authentication (SPF, DKIM, DMARC), low spam complaints, direct user interactions.
Adapting to the evolving landscape
To succeed in this evolving environment, email marketers need to adapt their strategies significantly. The foundation remains strong email authentication. Ensuring your domains are properly configured with SPF, DKIM, and DMARC is more important than ever. These protocols verify your sending identity and build trust with mailbox providers, which is a crucial component of reputation. You can use a tool like our DMARC record generator to get started with DMARC.
I recommend focusing on content relevance and audience segmentation. Sending highly targeted and valuable content to engaged subscribers will naturally lead to better inbox placement and positive interactions, even if direct open rates are obscured. Actively cleaning your lists to remove inactive subscribers can help maintain a healthy sender reputation and avoid spam traps or blocklisting. It also helps in understanding why bounce rates spike on campaigns from Verizon Media Group.
Furthermore, marketers should prioritize other, more reliable engagement metrics that are not affected by privacy measures. These include clicks on internal links within the email (if not proxied by the mailbox provider), conversions on landing pages, direct replies, and customer service interactions stemming from email campaigns. Building strong brand affinity through consistent, valuable communication will foster trust and engagement that transcends simple tracking pixels. Remember, understanding why your emails fail is key to improving deliverability.
Regularly audit and clean your email lists to maintain high engagement.
Prioritize email authentication (SPF, DKIM, DMARC) for better deliverability.
Focus on content relevance and personalization to drive intrinsic engagement.
Monitor alternative engagement metrics like website conversions and direct replies.
Common pitfalls
Over-reliance on open rates as the sole measure of email success.
Neglecting email authentication standards, leading to inbox placement issues.
Sending to unengaged or outdated lists, increasing spam complaint rates.
Failing to adapt measurement strategies to new privacy norms.
Expert tips
Use A/B testing on subject lines and content to find what resonates, not just what gets opens.
Implement feedback loops where available to quickly identify and remove complainers.
Integrate email performance data with CRM or sales data for a holistic view.
Understand your audience’s preferred engagement times, rather than fixed send times.
Expert view
Expert from Email Geeks says the line about Verizon Media believing customer tracking is wrong indicates a major paradigm shift in email marketing, as privacy experts increasingly view open and link tracking as privacy invasions.
2020-04-08 - Email Geeks
Expert view
Expert from Email Geeks says for View Time Optimization (VTO), Verizon Media likely accepts emails at the SMTP layer but delays relaying them to the end user, displaying them at an optimal time.
2020-04-08 - Email Geeks
Navigating email privacy and deliverability
Verizon Media's (Yahoo's) approach to email tracking and data access signifies a critical pivot in the email industry, moving towards enhanced user privacy. While challenging traditional marketing metrics, this shift compels senders to focus on foundational deliverability practices and authentic engagement. The move to anonymized data feeds, though potentially costly and exclusive to larger entities, highlights the changing landscape where direct tracking is diminishing.
Ultimately, success in this environment hinges on building and maintaining a stellar sender reputation, delivering valuable content, and prioritizing the user experience. Adapting to these changes, rather than resisting them, will be key to ensuring your emails consistently reach the inbox. It's about earning the right to be in the inbox through relevance and trust, not just through tracking. For further insights, consider exploring our email deliverability report.
