How are analytics engagement metrics defined?

Engagement statistics, or how long a recipient reads an email, are determined by 3 “threshold” settings: read, skim and delete.

The read threshold is the maximum amount of time that we will track engagement. Any amount of time over the skim threshold will be considered read. The read threshold can be set from a maximum of 29 seconds or to a minimum of one second more than the skim threshold. A higher setting enables you to analyze not only how many readers got past the skim threshold, but also how many readers stayed on for 15 seconds, 20 seconds and so on. A lower setting lumps all users who got past the skim threshold into one group. The default setting for the read threshold is 15 seconds.

The skim threshold should represent readers who glanced at the email but didn’t keep it open long enough to read the whole thing. The default setting for the skim threshold is 7 seconds.

The delete threshold should represent readers who opened the email just long enough to delete it. Sometimes subscribers will see an unwanted email and delete it without opening it, but many other users open all emails in sequence and delete or read them as they go. Mobile users also often find it easier to open a message and then delete it. Because of this we include a low threshold, below which emails are considered not to have been read at all. The default setting for the delete threshold is 2 seconds.