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That's my post there. It'd be very interesting to compare email confirmation rates. I am running on a private mail server that is configured according to all po

That's my post there. It'd be very interesting to compare email confirmation rates. I am running on a private mail server that is configured according to all possible spam filtering guidelines and yet I am still at only 82%. I wonder if these 18% is just people overwhelmed with emails in their Inbox or if there's still some issues with being mis-categorized as a spam. Anyone else cares to share their numbers?

moonlighter 15y ago
No scientific data here, but it sounds to me that 82% is pretty damn good. You'll never reach 100% because there'll always be folks who sign up and then simply don't follow thru. I know I'm guilty of that. It's like handing out Broadway show flyers... just because I take one doesn't mean I'm going to actually buy tickets to see the show.
larrik 15y ago
If you are looking for confirmations... perhaps a percentage just didn't use valid emails? Possibly accidentally?
- latitude 15y ago
  Yep, there are dupes and there are mistyped addresses. But plenty of unconfirmed @gmail.com (about 50%) as well as addresses personal servers (on judging by the domain names).
philfreo 15y ago
Are you tracking emails that bounce? Or people that have whitelists of who can email them? Then there's the people who always send signups to a special yahoo signup address they rarely check. You can probably do a little better than 82%, but I doubt you'll ever beat 95%.
dennisgorelik 15y ago
What's the best wording for email body with confirmation link? Currently I use: ==== Please open this link to confirm your email: http://www.postjobfree.com/a.aspx?k=c3d26a0fc5d145cf88898a92ea99cb20 http://www.postjobfree.com/a.aspx?k=c3d26a0fc5d145cf88898a92... This link will expire on: 8/19/2011 10:29:11 PM EST. ==== Thanks for the tip about subject for email confirmation! In the past I was using "Link to confirm your PostJobFree email", but your new version with clear call to action ("Please confirm your email address") should perform better.
- jcampbell1 15y ago
  You should drop the bit about the expiration. It requires someone to do a timezone calculation to even figure out what it means, and you probably want them to click the link even if it has expired, then you can give a proper support message with what they need to do.
  - michaelbuckbee 15y ago
    Agreed on the formatting, but I bet that having that expiration date on there increases the CTR.
- jabkobob 15y ago
  Please spell out the month name. In many countries dates are formatted as DD.MM.YYYY rather than MM/DD/YYYY. For example, a native German speaker will have a lot of trouble recognizing that date. Especially if it is something like 8/7/2011 (is that August 7 or July 8?) If you write the date as "August 8, 2011" it should be trivial to parse for everyone. (Except for people using different calendars)
  - rmc 15y ago
    Not only native Germans, other native English speakers, like people in the UK use the DD/MM/YY format. Unlike people from Germany, people from the UK have no language barrier, and are a potential customer.
    - jabkobob 15y ago
      Yes, you are totally right. But don't overrate the language barrier: I sell a software product that is English only (localization is too expensive), and the majority of my customers are from non-English-speaking markets.
- qw 15y ago
  I think it would be even more user friendly if you included a more readable expiration. Something like "this link will expire in 2 days (8/19/2011 10:29:11 PM EST)". This gives the user a more understandable deadline, without having to check the current date
prawn 15y ago
What about: Next Step: Confirm your email address Thinking along the lines of how "Follow me on Twitter" tests better than "If you liked this blog entry, please follow me on Twitter." Just give people a direct order. "Next step" might make it clearer that they're not yet finished with the process?
- rodh 15y ago
  Interesting idea. Having said that, "Next Step" makes it sounds like a longer process. It doesn't seem like I won't be quite done after this. I think rewarding the user for singing up would be an interesting incentive. "Click the link to receive your first email". Having said that, unlike registration confirmations, where I would like to get back out of my inbox to your site. For mailing lists, I don't need to go back to your site, really. I'd much rather stay in my inbox if that's ok. I'd quite like to see an A/B test between the usual method and a request for people reply to the email, rather than click a link. "Reply to this email to start receiving updates": simple order, direct resulting action. It also makes it sound like a similar action will be required to stop receiving updates.
  - prawn 15y ago
    True. What about: "Final step: ..." or "Confirm your subscription to receive your first issue"? Wonder how many people are using web-based mail clients and whether that would impact a preference to reply or click?
- minikomi 15y ago
  "Awaiting email confirmation"
jcampbell1 15y ago
I am consistently running around 75%, with subject line "Confirm your email address". I am going to change it to "Please confirm your email address". I send the confirmation emails through Google's email servers (Google Apps). update: If I break it down by domain, I see gmail->80%, yahoo->70%, and hotmail->66%.
jcampbell1 15y ago
You should be able to get to 95%. On the form there is no indication that an action is required after entering my email address. I also see a generic "support" as the sender in gmail.
- latitude 15y ago
  Go, click on that link already. You are skewing my beautiful stats :) Good point regarding the sender name. I will play with it once HN wave subsides.
Liu 15y ago
Does simply seeing 82% vs. 50% enough? Shouldn't there be some significance measurements added to it? If you had only 6 people in this experiment maybe it is just a statistical error...
- metageek 15y ago
  If there were 6 people, he wouldn't be saying 82%. 83%, maybe.
revorad 15y ago
Are you going to email old subscribers (who didn't confirm) a reminder with the new subject line?
- latitude 15y ago
  Ha. That's a nice idea. Let me see if it works :)

moonlighter 15y ago

No scientific data here, but it sounds to me that 82% is pretty damn good. You'll never reach 100% because there'll always be folks who sign up and then simply don't follow thru. I know I'm guilty of that. It's like handing out Broadway show flyers... just because I take one doesn't mean I'm going to actually buy tickets to see the show.

larrik 15y ago

If you are looking for confirmations... perhaps a percentage just didn't use valid emails? Possibly accidentally?

latitude 15y ago
Yep, there are dupes and there are mistyped addresses. But plenty of unconfirmed @gmail.com (about 50%) as well as addresses personal servers (on judging by the domain names).

philfreo 15y ago

Are you tracking emails that bounce? Or people that have whitelists of who can email them? Then there's the people who always send signups to a special yahoo signup address they rarely check. You can probably do a little better than 82%, but I doubt you'll ever beat 95%.

dennisgorelik 15y ago

What's the best wording for email body with confirmation link? Currently I use: ==== Please open this link to confirm your email: http://www.postjobfree.com/a.aspx?k=c3d26a0fc5d145cf88898a92ea99cb20 http://www.postjobfree.com/a.aspx?k=c3d26a0fc5d145cf88898a92... This link will expire on: 8/19/2011 10:29:11 PM EST. ==== Thanks for the tip about subject for email confirmation! In the past I was using "Link to confirm your PostJobFree email", but your new version with clear call to action ("Please confirm your email address") should perform better.

jcampbell1 15y ago
You should drop the bit about the expiration. It requires someone to do a timezone calculation to even figure out what it means, and you probably want them to click the link even if it has expired, then you can give a proper support message with what they need to do.
- michaelbuckbee 15y ago
  Agreed on the formatting, but I bet that having that expiration date on there increases the CTR.
jabkobob 15y ago
Please spell out the month name. In many countries dates are formatted as DD.MM.YYYY rather than MM/DD/YYYY. For example, a native German speaker will have a lot of trouble recognizing that date. Especially if it is something like 8/7/2011 (is that August 7 or July 8?) If you write the date as "August 8, 2011" it should be trivial to parse for everyone. (Except for people using different calendars)
- rmc 15y ago
  Not only native Germans, other native English speakers, like people in the UK use the DD/MM/YY format. Unlike people from Germany, people from the UK have no language barrier, and are a potential customer.
  - jabkobob 15y ago
    Yes, you are totally right. But don't overrate the language barrier: I sell a software product that is English only (localization is too expensive), and the majority of my customers are from non-English-speaking markets.
qw 15y ago
I think it would be even more user friendly if you included a more readable expiration. Something like "this link will expire in 2 days (8/19/2011 10:29:11 PM EST)". This gives the user a more understandable deadline, without having to check the current date

prawn 15y ago

What about: Next Step: Confirm your email address Thinking along the lines of how "Follow me on Twitter" tests better than "If you liked this blog entry, please follow me on Twitter." Just give people a direct order. "Next step" might make it clearer that they're not yet finished with the process?

rodh 15y ago
Interesting idea. Having said that, "Next Step" makes it sounds like a longer process. It doesn't seem like I won't be quite done after this. I think rewarding the user for singing up would be an interesting incentive. "Click the link to receive your first email". Having said that, unlike registration confirmations, where I would like to get back out of my inbox to your site. For mailing lists, I don't need to go back to your site, really. I'd much rather stay in my inbox if that's ok. I'd quite like to see an A/B test between the usual method and a request for people reply to the email, rather than click a link. "Reply to this email to start receiving updates": simple order, direct resulting action. It also makes it sound like a similar action will be required to stop receiving updates.
- prawn 15y ago
  True. What about: "Final step: ..." or "Confirm your subscription to receive your first issue"? Wonder how many people are using web-based mail clients and whether that would impact a preference to reply or click?
minikomi 15y ago
"Awaiting email confirmation"

jcampbell1 15y ago

I am consistently running around 75%, with subject line "Confirm your email address". I am going to change it to "Please confirm your email address". I send the confirmation emails through Google's email servers (Google Apps). update: If I break it down by domain, I see gmail->80%, yahoo->70%, and hotmail->66%.

jcampbell1 15y ago

You should be able to get to 95%. On the form there is no indication that an action is required after entering my email address. I also see a generic "support" as the sender in gmail.

latitude 15y ago
Go, click on that link already. You are skewing my beautiful stats :) Good point regarding the sender name. I will play with it once HN wave subsides.

Liu 15y ago

Does simply seeing 82% vs. 50% enough? Shouldn't there be some significance measurements added to it? If you had only 6 people in this experiment maybe it is just a statistical error...

metageek 15y ago
If there were 6 people, he wouldn't be saying 82%. 83%, maybe.

revorad 15y ago

Are you going to email old subscribers (who didn't confirm) a reminder with the new subject line?

latitude 15y ago
Ha. That's a nice idea. Let me see if it works :)