Responders Report

The Responders Report tracks the full lifecycle of your automated email campaigns — from the moment a responder is scheduled through delivery, engagement, and click-through. By monitoring each stage of the email funnel, you can identify deliverability issues, optimize engagement, and ensure your automated communications are driving results.

What This Report Includes

This report analyzes responder campaign performance within the selected date range.

Responder Events Included:

All responder events within the selected date range
Test orders are excluded
Date range is based on Scheduled Date (when the responder was scheduled to send)

Why This Matters: Automated email responders are a critical touchpoint in the customer journey — from welcome sequences to win-back campaigns. If responders aren't being delivered, opened, or clicked, you're missing key opportunities to engage customers, drive revenue, and reduce churn.

Prerequisites

Deliverability metrics (opens, clicks, bounces) require Sendgrid or Vrio's built-in email service. SMTP connections do not provide deliverability tracking data.

Report Metrics

Scheduled

The total number of responder emails that were queued for delivery during the selected period. This is your top-of-funnel email metric, representing the total volume of automated emails your system intended to send. A drop in scheduled volume may indicate changes to your responder rules, audience size, or triggering conditions.

Sent

The total number of responder emails that were successfully handed off to your email service provider for delivery. This metric is available as an additional column. The difference between Scheduled and Sent may indicate processing delays, suppression rules, or system issues that prevented emails from being dispatched.

Sent Rate

The percentage of scheduled responders that were successfully sent. This is calculated as Sent divided by Scheduled. A Sent Rate below 100% means some scheduled emails were not dispatched — investigate suppression lists, processing errors, or email service provider issues if this metric drops unexpectedly.

Total Bounced

The total number of sent emails that were returned as undeliverable. Bounces occur when an email address is invalid, the recipient's mailbox is full, or the receiving server rejects the message. This metric is available as an additional column. High bounce counts can damage your sender reputation and reduce future deliverability.

Bounce Rate

The percentage of sent emails that bounced. This is calculated as Total Bounced divided by Sent. Industry benchmarks typically target a bounce rate below 2%. A bounce rate above this threshold suggests list hygiene issues — invalid or outdated email addresses in your subscriber base that should be cleaned.

Total Delivered

The total number of emails that were accepted by the recipient's email server. Delivery means the email reached the server — it does not guarantee the email landed in the inbox (it could be in spam or a promotions tab). This metric is available as an additional column.

Delivered Rate

The percentage of sent emails that were successfully delivered. This is calculated as Total Delivered divided by Sent. This is the inverse of your bounce rate and confirms what share of your emails made it past the initial delivery gate. Aim for a Delivered Rate above 98%.

Opens

The total number of responder emails that were opened by recipients. An open is tracked when the recipient's email client loads the tracking pixel embedded in the email. This metric is available as an additional column. Note that privacy features in some email clients may block open tracking, which can cause underreporting.

Open Rate

The percentage of sent emails that were opened. This is calculated as Opens divided by Sent. Open rate reflects the effectiveness of your subject lines, sender name, and send timing. While open tracking has limitations due to email client privacy features, trends in open rate over time remain a valuable engagement signal.

Clicks

The total number of clicks on links within opened responder emails. This measures active engagement — the recipient not only opened the email but took action by clicking through to your site or landing page. This metric is available as an additional column.

Click Through Rate

The percentage of opened emails that resulted in a click. This is calculated as Clicks divided by Opens. Click Through Rate measures the effectiveness of your email content, calls-to-action, and offer relevance. A low CTR with a healthy open rate suggests your email content or CTA needs improvement, while a low open rate with healthy CTR suggests subject line optimization is the priority.

Available Dimensions

Use these dimensions to slice and filter your responder data for deeper analysis.

Dimension	Description
Responder Scheduled Date	The date the responder (email) was scheduled to send
Responder Scheduled Hour	Hour of day when the responder was scheduled (0–23)
Responder Scheduled Day Of Week	Day of the week the responder was scheduled
Responder Scheduled Week	ISO week number of the scheduled responder
Responder Scheduled Month	Month and year of the scheduled responder
Responder Scheduled Year	Year the responder was scheduled
Customer ID	The customer's ID in the system
Customer Name	The customer's full name
Customer Information	Combined customer details (name, email, phone) for searching
Connection	The connection (CRM instance) associated with the customer
Order ID	The unique order identifier
Is Blacklist	Whether the customer is on the blacklist
Responder	The specific responder (email template) that was sent
Campaign	The campaign associated with the order
Primary Campaign Category	Primary category assigned to the campaign
Secondary Campaign Category	Secondary category assigned to the campaign
Ship Country	Shipping destination country
Ship State	Shipping destination state or province

Key Business Insights

Full Funnel Visibility: Walk through the funnel from Scheduled → Sent → Delivered → Opens → Clicks to identify the stage with the largest drop-off. Each stage has distinct optimization levers — technical configuration for delivery, creative for opens, and content for clicks.
Bounce Rate as a Health Indicator: Monitor your Bounce Rate closely. Rising bounce rates damage your sender reputation with email providers, which can cascade into lower delivery rates across all your email communications — not just responders.
Open Rate Trends Over Privacy Changes: Due to email privacy features (like Apple's Mail Privacy Protection), individual open rate values may be less reliable than they once were. Focus on trends in open rate over time rather than absolute numbers.
Click Through Rate Optimization: CTR is the most actionable engagement metric because it's the least affected by privacy features and directly measures whether your email content resonated enough to drive action.
Sent Rate Monitoring: If your Sent Rate drops below 100%, investigate immediately. Unsent scheduled emails represent missed customer touchpoints and could indicate technical issues with your email integration.

Optimization Strategies

Improve Deliverability

Authenticate your sending domain with SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records
Monitor your sender reputation score and address any flags promptly

Increase Open Rates

A/B test subject lines to identify what resonates with your audience
Use personalized sender names to increase trust and curiosity
Keep subject lines concise, clear, and relevant to the email content

Boost Click Through Rates

Ensure every email has a clear, prominent call-to-action above the fold
Test different CTA styles — buttons vs. text links, different colors, and varied copy
Make email content scannable with clear headings, short paragraphs, and visual hierarchy
Ensure landing pages match the promise of the email to maintain consistency after the click

Monitor and Maintain

Review responder performance weekly to catch issues early
Set threshold alerts for Bounce Rate, Sent Rate, and Click Through Rate
Compare performance across different responder types (welcome, win-back, upsell) to identify which automations need attention
Archive or update underperforming responders rather than letting them continue to send

Pro Tips

Use the additional columns (Sent, Total Bounced, Total Delivered, Opens, Clicks) to build a complete funnel view. The default rate-focused view is ideal for quick health checks, while the volume columns are essential for diagnosing specific issues.
Benchmark by responder type. Welcome emails typically have higher open and click rates than ongoing nurture sequences. Compare similar responder types against each other rather than averaging across all campaigns.
Pair this report with conversion data from other reports to connect email engagement to revenue. A responder with a high click-through rate but low downstream conversion may need its landing page optimized, not its email content.
Watch for sudden drops in Scheduled volume — this often indicates a change in your responder rules or triggering logic rather than a natural decline in audience size.

Frequently Asked Questions

How are opens tracked, and are they accurate? Opens are tracked using a small invisible image (tracking pixel) embedded in the email. When the recipient's email client loads this image, an open is recorded. Some email clients block image loading by default or pre-load images for privacy, which can cause both underreporting and overreporting. Use open rate trends over time as your guide rather than relying on any single day's figure.