With Apple’s iOS 14.5 update and its many changes to tracking technology having now arrived, attention is already turning to what’s next for marketers.
iOS 15 has already been announced and is set to be arriving in iPhone Settings apps later this year.
The new software update builds on the progress of iOS 14.5, with privacy continuing to serve as a defining feature for Apple devices.
Central to iOS 15 is Mail Privacy Protection, which will reportedly allow users to block third parties from tracking data such as email opens.
This, of course, poses a huge threat to email marketing campaigns that have relied so heavily on insights such as open rates and clickthroughs.
With these significant changes on the horizon, marketers are already looking at what email marketing might look like in the not-so-distant future.
“Historically, we’ve used open rates to indicate list engagement. Marketers will no longer have visibility over this for iOS users,” said Reload Media email marketing lead Jessica McMahon.
“However, Apple will still know who is opening emails and use this as a deliverability metric.”
While open rates have proven to be an effective metric when it comes to measuring user engagement, McMahon believes marketers can still keep an eye on who’s interested using different methods.
This could come in the form of ‘engaged’ segments, said McMahon, which are based on clicks and the recency of sign-ups, as opposed to open rates.
As well as keeping an eye on users that are engaged, it will also be important to identify users that are losing interest.
“Creating a sunset flow that triggers based on lapsed engagement (clicks) to phase out unengaged subscribers will be imperative to keeping a list clean over time,” McMahon said.
