Glossary
Reply rate
Reply rate is the share of first emails that receive a reply from a real person, usually shown as a percentage of emails sent.
Why it matters when you send from your own Gmail
Only a rate that counts the right things is useful. Automatic replies, bounces and opt-outs are not interest. Honest Intros sorts inbound messages into bounces, out-of-office notices, opt-outs, people who have left the company and genuine replies, so those can be kept out of the count. A rate measured on 50 emails is also noisy: judge a message over a few hundred sends and change one thing at a time.
Example
You send 50 first emails. Four messages come back: one out-of-office, one opt-out, two real replies. Your reply rate is 2 in 50, which is 4%. Counting all four would claim 8%.
What to do
Track real replies only, split into positive and negative, and compare messages only when they went to a similar kind of prospect. A single week of data is rarely enough.
Related terms
All terms are on the glossary.