Click through rate: one name, three sums, and the one to steer by
The share of people who clicked a link in your email. Simple enough, until you notice three different tools mean three different sums by it.
- 017Click-Through Rate (CTR)
- The percentage of email recipients who clicked on one or more links contained in an email.
- Measured as
- Unique clicks divided by emails delivered, which Klaviyo calls click rate
- Often confused with
- Click-to-open rate, which divides the same clicks by opens instead
- In ads and search
- Clicks divided by impressions, the times a listing was shown
Three different sums answer to click-through rate
Here's the awkward bit. The name covers three different sums, and the tools don't agree which one they mean. Klaviyo's click rate divides the people who clicked by the people who got the email. What Klaviyo labels click-through rate divides them by the people who opened it, which most of the industry calls click-to-open.
| What you're looking at | Clicks divided by | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|
| Klaviyo's click rate | Emails delivered | How many people the email moved to act |
| Click-to-open rate | Opens | How well the email worked on the people who opened it |
| Google Ads and Search Console | Impressions | How often people who saw a listing chose it |
So before anyone compares two numbers, ask which row they're quoting. A click-to-open figure always looks healthier than a click rate on the same email. That's arithmetic, not performance.
Why clicks became the honest number in your inbox
Opens stopped meaning much once Apple Mail started loading images for its users, the story behind an inflated open rate. A click is harder to fake. Somebody chose a link and landed on your site.
It breaks click-to-open, though. Machine opens swell the bottom of that sum, so the rate falls while the same number of people click. Use click rate on delivered and leave opens out of it.
Clicks aren't spotless either. Some company mail systems open every link to scan it first, so a burst of clicks seconds after the send, all from work addresses, is usually software.
What a good click rate looks like on your own account
Honestly? Yours from last quarter, on the same kind of send. A flow that fires on something the person just did will out-click a Friday campaign to the whole list almost every time. That's the audience, not the copy.
- Campaigns against campaigns, sent to similar segments
- Each flow against its own history, never the campaign average
- One segment over time, which shows fatigue before the unsubscribes do
- Clicks per link, to see whether the hero product or the footer earned the visit
A falling click rate on a steady segment usually means the emails got samey, or the list's hearing from you more than it wants to. Neither gets fixed by a brighter button.
Lifting click rate without chasing the wrong clicks
Give each email one job. One clear reason to click beats twelve links fighting for the thumb. Put that reason near the top, make the button say where it goes, and send it to people who've clicked something recently.
Then judge it on what happened after the click. A click that lands on a slow page or an empty basket isn't a win, and that's where conversion rate takes over. Read clicks and placed orders side by side, the way we build email systems.
Related terms
FAQs
What's the difference between click rate and click-through rate in Klaviyo?
Click rate divides the people who clicked by the people who received the email. Klaviyo's click-through rate divides them by the people who opened it, which most of the industry calls click-to-open. Check the column heading before you compare two emails, or two agencies' slides.
Why do we get clicks but no sales from an email?
Usually it's the landing, not the email. The page didn't do its job: an out of stock product, a surprise delivery cost, a slow mobile page, or a link to the homepage instead of the product. Check where the clicks landed before you rewrite a word.
Do clicks from Apple Mail users count properly?
Yes. Apple's privacy feature loads the images in an email, it doesn't follow the links, so a click from an Apple Mail reader is still a person choosing to visit. That's why clicks survived the change when opens didn't.
Rather we explained it on your own account?
Bring your Klaviyo account to a growth consultation. We'll walk through what this means for your numbers, in plain English, and what we'd fix first.
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