2020

EMAIL
DELIVERABILITY
BENCHMARK
A N A LY S I S O F W O R L D W I D E I N B O X
A N D S P A M P L A C E M E N T R AT E S
 03 14

INTRODUCTION INBOX PLACEMENT

IN EUROPE

07 19

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK GLOBAL INBOX INBOX PLACEMENT

PLACEMENT IN ASIA-PACIFIC

TABLE OF
CONTENTS 09 22

INBOX PLACEMENT GETTING TO

IN NORTH AMERICA THE INBOX

11 23

INBOX PLACEMENT METHODOLOGY

IN LATIN AMERICA
INTRODUCTION
To give their mailbox users the best possible experience, mailbox providers
have strong restrictions in place on what mail to accept into their inboxes.
Because of this high threshold for acceptance, one in six messages does not
reach the inbox. In addition, more than half of the messages that don’t reach
the inbox are not even landing in the spam folder— and are missing from
subscribers’ email accounts, never to be seen or interacted with.

What’s even more concerning, is many marketers are unaware their messages
are missing the inbox. Misconceptions about metrics and lack of data lead
many marketers to fall below this average. Without even knowing they have
deliverability issues, marketers will continue to miss out on building valuable
relationships and achieving the highest possible ROI.

In this year’s annual benchmark report, we take a look at what deliverability

means, where email can get delivered, and how to measure inbox placement.
We also explore the global, regional, and country inbox placement results for all
of 2019 and compare it to the previous year.

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – INTRODUCTION 3

What is deliverability? Did you know?
Deliverability is a sender's ability to be delivered to the inbox. Your email program • Inbox placement rate is calculated as the
performance and ROI relies on your ability to reach the inbox. No matter how engaging number of emails delivered to the inbox out of
your subject line is or enticing the offer, if the message doesn't reach the inbox, total emails sent.
subscribers won’t interact with it—costing you potential revenue.
• Spam placement rate is calculated as the
Often, marketers rely on their delivered rate shown in their email marketing dashboards number of emails delivered to the spam folder
provided by their email service provider (ESP) to judge the performance of their out of total emails sent. Your spam placement
deliverability. However, the term “delivered” can be misleading. Email, once sent, can be rate shows the percentage of emails that were
delivered to many different places inside a mailbox provider system. Delivered rate only identified as unsolicited bulk email, or spam, by
measures the amount of email that was accepted and rejected by the mailbox provider the receiving mailbox provider’s spam filtering
due to things like invalid addresses and blacklistings. What your delivered rate doesn’t system.
tell you is if those messages landed in the inbox, the spam folder, or went missing.
• Missing rate is the percentage of mail that did
To find out if your messages arrived in the inbox, you need to look at your inbox not arrive in the inbox or spam folder but has
placement rate. Your inbox placement rate is a more accurate and reliable way to been deferred for blocked by the mailbox
measure deliverability and the success of an email campaign, since it measures how provider.
much email was delivered to the inbox versus email delivered to the spam folder in
addition to messages rejected or blocked.

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – INTRODUCTION 4

What happens after you hit send?
After you hit send, there are many checks messages go through. To the right is a
representation of the filters each message encounters on its journey. Email that is
INBOX
deemed malicious, untrustworthy, or has a poor reputation is often blocked at the
gateway, never reaching either the inbox or the spam folder. For messages that
make it past the gateway, spam filters look at the reputation of the sender,
subscriber engagement, and content to decide if they should be placed in the
inbox or the spam folder for each subscriber. Emails that make it past both SPAM
gateway and spam filters are the only ones that reach the inbox.

How do you measure deliverability?

In this benchmark, we use seed data to track and measure how email is delivered around the world. Seed addresses are one of the original methods used to
measure inbox placement.

Have you ever tested an email campaign’s deliverability by sending it to your personal email address? That’s similar to how seed addresses work. But at
Return Path from Validity, we have seed addresses at hundreds of mailbox providers and filters around the world. When marketers send emails to these seed
addresses, our software checks to see if it was delivered and reports whether it went to the inbox or the spam folder. You can learn more about how seeds
measure deliverability in our guide, “What is a Seed?”

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – INTRODUCTION 5

The state of deliverability
Deliverability is not static. Shifts in the industry, adjustments to spam filtering algorithms, and
changes in consumer preferences impacts inbox placement for not only one brand, but for the
entire industry.

One big shift in the world over the last few years is the focus on data privacy. While GDPR came
into effect in 2018, many other countries and US states have enacted or have proposed new data
privacy laws since, causing marketers to reevaluate their data and marketing practices to comply.

Deliverability can also be impacted by mailbox providers who are constantly evaluating their
current filtering equations to adapt to feedback from their users. For example, Gmail made some
minor changes to their filtering in October of 2019 to which some marketers saw slight dips in
their inbox placement, while others saw no change.

In addition to changes in the industry, any new campaign or tactic you try can have an influence
on your deliverability. It's important to keep a pulse on what's happening both internally and
globally that may influence your deliverability and overall performance.

In the following pages we report the average inbox placement, spam placement, and missing
rates globally, by region, and by country. Take a look at the metrics and compare them against
your own performance.

Note: Due to rounding, some placement calculations will be slightly over or under 100%

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – INTRODUCTION 6

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK

Global Inbox
Placement
Globally, the average inbox placement rate was 83 percent
in 2019—meaning one out of every six messages failed to
reach the inbox. Global deliverability saw a slight decline of
two percentage points from the 2018 average of 85 percent.

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – GLOBAL INBOX PLACEMENT 7

GLOBAL INBOX PLACEMENT

GLOBAL - INBOX PLACEMENT

84% 7% 9% 83% 7% 10% 82% 7% 10% 83% 7% 10% 83% 7% 10%

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 Year To Date Average

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -2% +1% 0%

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – GLOBAL INBOX PLACEMENT 8

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK

Inbox Placement
In North America
Deliverability to North American inboxes was equal to the global average in
2019, at 83 percent. United States inboxes saw an average of 82 percent inbox
placement in 2019, while marketers sending to Canadian inboxes exceeded the
global and regional average with an inbox placement rate of 89 percent.

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INBOX PLACEMENT IN NORTH AMERICA

NORTH AMERICA - INBOX PLACEMENT

83% 8% 9% 83% 8% 10% 82% 8% 10% 83% 8% 9% 83% 8% 9%

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 Year To Date Average

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -1% +1% 0%

CANADA - INBOX PLACEMENT UNITED STATES - INBOX PLACEMENT

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

6% 7% 8% 9% 8% 10% 10% 10% 9% 10%

4% 3% 4% 4% 4%
8% 8% 9% 9% 8%

90% 90% 89% 87% 89% 82% 82% 81% 82% 82%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change +1% 0% -1% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -1% +1% 0%

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – INBOX PLACEMENT IN NORTH AMERICA 10

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK

Inbox Placement
In Latin America
Like their northern counterpart, inbox placement for countries in Latin America
matched the global average at 83 percent. Argentina led the region with an
average inbox placement rate of 89 percent, while Brazil saw just four out of five
messages reach the inbox (81 percent). Overall inbox placement in Latin
America saw no change year-over-year. Argentina and Brazil saw slight
increases in inbox placement, while Mexico saw a drop in deliverability of five
percentage points.

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INBOX PLACEMENT IN LATIN AMERICA

LATIN AMERICA - INBOX PLACEMENT

83% 7% 10% 82% 6% 12% 82% 7% 10% 83% 8% 9% 83% 7% 10%

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 Year To Date Average

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change 0% -2% +2%

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INBOX PLACEMENT IN LATIN AMERICA

ARGENTINA - INBOX PLACEMENT MEXICO - INBOX PLACEMENT

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

13% 9% 3% 5% 2% 4% 3%
8% 7% 12% 13% 10% 10%
3% 6%
4% 5% 4% 5%
5%

88% 92% 94% 89% 88% 83% 82% 86% 85%

84%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change +1% 0% -1% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -5% -1% +7%

BRAZIL - INBOX PLACEMENT

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

11% 12% 10% 10% 11%

8% 7% 9% 10% 9%

81% 81% 81% 81% 81%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change +1% -2% +1%

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2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK

Inbox Placement
In Europe
Deliverability to European mailboxes fell slightly from the previous year
to an average inbox placement rate of 84 percent—just above the
global average. Marketers sending to subscribers in Belgium and the
Czech Republic had Europe’s highest inbox placement at 92 percent.
One quarter of messages sent to German mailboxes failed to reach
consumers, while messages to Swiss subscribers saw an inbox
placement of just 67 percent.

The Czech Republic and the Netherlands were the only European
countries to see an increase in deliverability compared to the previous
year (12 percentage points and three percentage points, respectively).
Russia and Ireland saw the largest declines in inbox placement, down
seven percentage points compared to the previous year.

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – INBOX PLACEMENT IN EUROPE 14

INBOX PLACEMENT IN EUROPE

EUROPE - INBOX PLACEMENT

86% 7% 8% 84% 7% 10% 82% 7% 10% 83% 7% 10% 84% 7% 10%

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 Year To Date Average

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -3% 0% +3%

AUSTRIA BELGIUM

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

5% 9% 12% 9% 9% 6% 6% 19% 1% 3% 8%
12% 13% 11% 11% 12%

83% 79% 77% 80% 80% 94% 94% 81% 96% 92%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -3% -1% +4% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change 0% 0% 0%

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – INBOX PLACEMENT IN EUROPE 15

INBOX PLACEMENT IN EUROPE

CZECH REPUBLIC DENMARK

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

6% 4% 5% 8% 10% 15% 8% 6% 10%

18%
14%
13% 15% 13%
11%

83% 94% 96% 95% 92% 77% 74% 77% 80% 77%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change +12% -15% +3% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -3% +1% +2%

FRANCE GERMANY

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

6% 10% 9% 9% 9% 7% 10% 13% 12% 11%

3% 2% 2% 2% 2%
18% 14% 15% 14% 15%

91% 88% 89% 89% 89% 75% 76% 73% 74% 74%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -2% -1% +2% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -2% -2% +4%

GREECE IRELAND

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

6% 30% 8% 3% 4% 12% 11% 24% 18% 12% 15%

1% 2% 1% 1%
6% 2%
5%
2%
1%

94% 70% 90% 93% 87% 88% 74% 77% 82% 82%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -3% +1% +3% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -7% +1% +6%

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – INBOX PLACEMENT IN EUROPE 16

INBOX PLACEMENT IN EUROPE

ITALY NETHERLANDS

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

12% 12% 12% 11% 12% 8% 7% 6% 4% 6%

7% 7% 8% 8% 7%
5% 5% 6% 6% 5%

83% 84% 82% 83% 83% 86% 86% 86% 88% 87%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -3% -1% +3% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change +3% -2% -1%

NORWAY RUSSIA

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

12% 17% 11% 8% 12% 5% 8% 9% 8% 8%

4%
8% 9% 9% 8%

88% 83% 89% 92% 88% 91% 84% 82% 83% 85%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -2% 0% +2% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -7% +6% +1%

SPAIN SWEDEN

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

10% 11% 12% 8% 10% 8% 2% 10% 2% 10% 2% 10% 2% 10% 2%

8% 6% 7% 7% 7%

83% 83% 81% 85% 83% 89% 88% 89% 88% 89%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change 0% +1% -1% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -1% +1% -1%

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – INBOX PLACEMENT IN EUROPE 17

INBOX PLACEMENT IN EUROPE

SWITZERLAND UNITED KINGDOM

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

4% 6% 7% 11% 7% 7% 10% 11% 10% 10%

26% 24% 26% 28% 26% 4% 4% 4% 4% 4%

70% 70% 68% 61% 67% 89% 86% 85% 86% 87%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -5% +1% +4% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -4% 0% +5%

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – INBOX PLACEMENT IN EUROPE 18

 2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK

Inbox Placement
In Asia-Pacific
Marketers sending to mailboxes in the Asia-Pacific region had an average
inbox placement rate of 84 percent in 2019. Messages in Japan saw the
highest inbox placement of all countries studied at 97 percent. Emails to
South Korean inboxes were successfully delivered only 74 percent of the
time, while in India only 69 percent of emails reached subscribers’ inboxes.

Year-over-year, inbox placement in the region dropped by two percentage

points. Most countries saw inbox placement rates remain relatively stable
from 2018 to 2019, but Singapore and South Korea experienced double
digit dips (10 percentage points and 20 percentage points, respectively.)

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INBOX PLACEMENT IN ASIA-PACIFIC

ASIA-PACIFIC - INBOX PLACEMENT

86% 3% 11% 84% 3% 14% 83% 3% 15% 84% 3% 13% 84% 3% 13%

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 Year To Date Average

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -2% 0% +2%

AUSTRALIA CHINA

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

7% 12% 11% 8% 10% 17% 15% 16% 21% 17%

3% 2% 2% 2% 2%
3% 3% 3% 3%
2%

90% 86% 87% 90% 88% 80% 82% 81% 77% 80%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change 0% -1% +1% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change +4% 0% -3%

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INBOX PLACEMENT IN ASIA-PACIFIC

HONG KONG INDIA

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

6% 10% 11% 9% 9% 29% 30% 31% 23% 29%

2% 2% 2% 1% 2%

3%
2% 2% 2%
3%

91% 88% 87% 89% 89% 69% 67% 67% 74% 69%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -3% 0% +3% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -1% 0% 0%

JAPAN NEW ZEALAND

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

1% 3% 1% 4% 1% 2% 1% 1% 1% 2% 9% 10% 12% 7% 10%

1% 8% 3%

96% 96% 98% 98% 97% 90% 89% 88% 85% 88%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change 0% 0% 0% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -4% +2% +2%

SINGAPORE SOUTH KOREA

2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average 2019 - Q1 2019 - Q2 2019 - Q3 2019 - Q4 YTD Average

7% 13% 16% 13% 12% 7% 10% 25% 28% 18%

5% 6%
5% 4% 5% 9%
5%
8%

9% 7%

88% 82% 79% 83% 83% 87% 82% 66% 65% 74%

Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -10% 0% +10% Inbox Placement Rate Spam Placement Rate Missing Rate % Change -20% +7% +13%

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GETTING TO THE INBOX
One out of every six messages failed to reach subscribers in 2019—that's a lot of potential revenue marketers are missing out on. While reaching the inbox isn’t an easy
matter, there are a few simple steps that can increase the chances your messages will pass through filters and reach your subscribers.

Track your inbox placement Keep your list clean

You can’t fix a problem you don’t know about. Having access Keeping a subscriber list free from spam traps, unknown
to and monitoring your inbox placement rate will allow you to users, and inactive subscribers will help boost your
more accurately judge the health of your program and can reputation and your ability to reach the inbox. Run your entire
alert you to when your messages are being blocked by list through a list hygiene service and make sure any new
mailbox providers. addresses you add are verified as real, active email accounts.

Monitor your reputation Check to see if you’ve been

blacklisted
Your reputation is one of the main factors that mailbox
providers use to determine whether to place your messages Blacklists are lists of known spammers that mailbox
in the inbox or the spam folder. Always check your sender providers reference when making deliverability decisions.
reputation before you send a new campaign to make sure Consult a blacklist lookup service to ensure your IP address
mailbox providers will evaluate your messages favorably, hasn’t been blacklisted. If you find that you are listed,
improving your ability to reach the inbox. You can learn more consult that specific blacklist’s delisting requirements and
about the value of sender reputation in the Sender Score follow their stated procedures.
Benchmark Report.

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – GETTING TO THE INBOX 22

METHODOLOGY
Return Path from Validity conducted this study using a
representative sample of more than 2 billion promotional email
messages sent to consumers around the world between January 1,
2019, and December 31, 2019. Global and regional statistics are
based on performance across more than 140 mailbox providers in
North America, South America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific. Country
statistics are based on a subset of senders whose locations and
industry classifications are identifiable.

2020 EMAIL DELIVERABILITY BENCHMARK – METHODOLOGY 23

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