Why is my California email list having low engagement?

Key findings

• Not a deliverability issue: If emails are consistently landing in the inbox (e.g., Gmail's promotions tab) and open rates are comparable to other lists, the problem isn't typically with initial delivery or sender reputation concerning major ISPs. The emails are getting through, but the recipients are not taking the next step.
• Audience segmentation and relevance: The primary cause is often a misalignment between the email content or offer and the specific interests or needs of the California audience segment. Even if the list is geographically verified, their preferences might differ from other segments receiving similar content.
• Geolocation data accuracy: Reliance on geolocation based on email opens can be misleading, especially with services like Gmail that route opens through image proxies in various locations (including California). This means the reported location might not always reflect the subscriber's true physical location.
• Regional factors: Economic conditions, local cultural nuances, or specific event relevance within California could play a role. For virtual events, time zones could also affect engagement if not properly accounted for.

Key considerations

• Content and offer optimization: Re-evaluate your email content, subject lines, calls to action, and the offers themselves to ensure they resonate specifically with your California audience. Personalized content can significantly boost engagement.
• Refining audience insights: Go beyond basic geographic data. Consider surveying your California list, analyzing past successful campaigns for this segment, or exploring other demographic or psychographic data points that can inform better segmentation. You might even consider if you're seeing open rate drops specifically in California.
• Testing email rendering across clients: While unlikely to be the sole cause of widespread low engagement if opens are high, inconsistencies in how your emails display on popular email clients used by Californians could hinder click-throughs. Ensure your campaigns are rendering correctly everywhere.
• Monitor engagement beyond opens: While open rates indicate delivery, true engagement is measured by clicks, conversions, and replies. Focus on improving these metrics. For more insights, refer to guides on how to identify and fix low email engagement.
• Refine list quality: Even with local partnerships, continuously ensuring your list consists of truly interested and active subscribers is vital. Poor list quality, even with good initial delivery, can lead to overall low engagement. If you are experiencing a sudden drop in email open rates, list quality is often a prime suspect.

Key opinions

• Beyond deliverability: Many marketers agree that if emails are reaching the inbox and being opened, the problem is not a traditional deliverability issue but rather an engagement problem stemming from content or audience mismatch.
• Audience intent: A common sentiment is that you cannot force engagement if the offer simply does not appeal to the recipients, regardless of their location.
• Content and offer relevance: If a virtual product or event is being marketed, its exact location should be less critical, suggesting that the issue is with the appeal of the content itself to the Californian demographic.
• Economic sensitivity: For non-profit events or those requiring donations, marketers consider whether regional economic conditions (like in California) might influence disposable income and charitable giving.
• Timezone impact: For virtual events, the timing of emails in relation to local time zones could significantly impact whether subscribers can engage when the event is live.

Key considerations

• Verify list origin: While the list might be built from local partnerships, re-confirm the actual geographical concentration of the active subscribers to ensure targeting is precise. Cleaning your email list may resolve some issues, but it's important to understand why you might still face deliverability issues even after cleaning.
• Test creatives and rendering: Even with good previews, some email clients or devices popular in California might have rendering or security problems that deter clicks. It's a complete guide to driving email engagement that covers these aspects.
• Experiment with messaging and offers: Run A/B tests on subject lines, email body content, calls to action, and even pricing or donation tiers (if applicable) to see what resonates. Consider campaigns tailored to specific regional interests or challenges.
• Align content with subscriber expectations: Ensure the content aligns with what subscribers anticipated when they opted in. Misaligned offerings can lead to a decline in engagement, even if emails are delivered.
• Domain consistency: While not directly an engagement factor, maintaining consistency in sending domains or sub-domains across segments ensures deliverability foundations are solid, allowing you to focus on content-related engagement issues.

Key opinions

• Inbox is not the problem: If emails are consistently hitting the inbox, deliverability itself is not the root cause of low click-through rates. The problem lies with what happens after the email is received.
• Geolocation data caveats: Geolocation based on opens can be unreliable due to Google's image proxy servers, many of which are located in California. This means that subscribers might not actually be in California, or your data could be skewed. This can lead to issues such as sudden open rate drops in specific US segments.
• Audience desire is paramount: Email campaigns cannot compel recipients to engage with content or offers they simply do not want or need. The content must align with recipient interests.
• Timezone considerations: For virtual events, the time of sending relative to the recipient's timezone is a critical factor often overlooked that can explain low engagement.

Key considerations

• Verify location data: If audience location is key, ensure it's captured directly (e.g., zip codes at sign-up) rather than inferred from unreliable methods like open-based geolocation. This directly impacts why your email deliverability rate might be wrong.
• Deep dive into audience needs: Conduct more in-depth research or surveys to understand the specific desires, challenges, and preferences of your California audience. Tailoring content can improve your email click-through rate.
• Optimize sending times: For virtual events, schedule emails to arrive at optimal times for the Pacific time zone, considering typical daily routines and peak engagement hours.
• Review content relevancy: Critically assess whether the content and calls to action are genuinely appealing and relevant to the specific demographics or psychographics within the California segment, especially if the product/event is virtual.
• Long-term sender reputation: While immediate deliverability isn't the problem, sustained low engagement can negatively impact sender reputation over time, leading to future inboxing issues. This is a key factor in preventing emails from going to spam.

Key findings

• Engagement as a ranking factor: Modern spam filters heavily weigh user engagement signals (opens, clicks, replies, forwards) to determine inbox placement. Low engagement, even with good open rates, can degrade sender reputation over time.
• Segmentation importance: Documentation frequently recommends list segmentation as a key strategy to improve relevance and, consequently, engagement. Generic emails to broad lists often underperform. This aligns with advice on how to handle email list segmentation.
• User feedback loops: ISPs offer feedback loops (FBLs) that provide insight into spam complaints, an explicit negative engagement signal. While not directly about low clicks, FBLs highlight the importance of active user signals.
• Content relevance: Official guides stress that content must be valuable and expected by the subscriber. Irrelevant content is a primary driver of disengagement.

Key considerations

• Monitor specific engagement metrics: Beyond open rates, actively track click-through rates, conversion rates, and unsubscribe rates. These metrics provide a more complete picture of subscriber engagement. Reviewing Google Postmaster Tools can offer valuable insights into your domain's reputation based on user feedback.
• Implement DMARC for authentication: While not directly addressing engagement, strong email authentication (SPF, DKIM, DMARC) ensures your emails are perceived as legitimate. This lays the groundwork for engagement by preventing messages from being flagged as spam. Ensure you know a simple guide to DMARC, SPF, and DKIM.
• Adhere to best practices: Consistently follow recommended sending volumes, list hygiene practices, and opt-in policies. These practices contribute to a healthy sender reputation, which supports both initial delivery and sustained engagement. For a general overview, consider best practices for email deliverability.
• Optimize calls to action (CTAs): Clear, compelling, and strategically placed CTAs are crucial. Documentation often implicitly supports optimizing these to drive clicks and conversions.