Percentage of email recipients who open a marketing or product email.
Unique Opens / Emails Delivered × 100
Higher is better · Unit: percentage
How to Improve
Segment lists by engagement level and personalize subject lines with recipient data. Send at optimal times based on timezone and past open behavior. Remove inactive subscribers quarterly.
Ehsan's Analysis
E-commerce companies at Series B stage are sitting on a goldmine of unrealized improvement in this metric. The gap between median and top-quartile represents millions in enterprise value. I have seen 15 companies close this gap in under 6 months by treating it as their primary OKR. The ones who fail treat it as a dashboard metric. The ones who win treat it as an operating principle.
EJ
Ehsan Jahandarpour
AI Growth Strategist & Fractional CMO
Forbes Top 20 Growth Hacker · TEDx Speaker · 716 Academic Citations · Ex-Microsoft · CMO at FirstWave (ASX:FCT) · Forbes Communications Council
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a good Email Open Rate for E-commerce at Series B?
Median is 17.1%. Top-quartile achieves 19.7%. Aim for top-quartile to attract investors.
How does SaaS Subscription model affect Email Open Rate?
The SaaS Subscription business model impacts this metric through pricing mechanics and customer behavior patterns. Benchmark against companies with the same model for accurate comparison.
How to improve Email Open Rate?
Focus on the primary driver for your stage. At Series B, the biggest lever is usually operational efficiency and product-market fit refinement.