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One of our <a href="https://kit.com/mission" target="_blank" rel="noopener">values</a> at Kit is to work in public. We strive for transparency, which is why we share information that is typically kept private, such as our <a href="https://convertkit.baremetrics.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">finances</a>.
One commonly asked question by creators looking for a new email marketing platform is, “How is your email deliverability?”
Here is our monthly deliverability report to answer that question:
If you missed previous Deliverability reports, you can check them out below:
<ul>
<li><a href="https://kit.com/resources/blog/august-2020-deliverability-report" target="_blank" rel="noopener">August 2020</a></li>
<li><a href="https://kit.com/resources/blog/september-2020-deliverability-report" target="_blank" rel="noopener">September 2020</a></li>
<li><a href="https://kit.com/resources/blog/october-2020-deliverability-report" target="_blank" rel="noopener">October 2020</a></li>
</ul>
<h2>In November, Kit sent over 1.3 billion messages (1,375,226,287 to be exact).</h2>
When messages are sent, they can be delivered or they can bounce. For more details on how email deliverability operates, check out our blog post <a href="https://kit.com/resources/blog/email-deliverability" target="_blank" rel="noopener">here</a>. But for a little TLDR- The more messages delivered, the better!
It is inevitable for some messages to bounce due to invalid addresses, full mailboxes, etc., but a good delivery rate indicates healthy deliverability for Kit. We consider a system-wide delivery rate of 98% and above to be very healthy.
<h2>In November, our system-wide delivery rate was 99.1%.</h2>
This high delivery rate indicates a healthy reputation for Kit, which gives our customers a solid foundation for their email deliverability. To get even more detailed about how well we’re performing, it helps to filter down by mailbox provider.
Here are the top 5 domains Kit sends to in terms of volume:
1. Gmail.com 
Volume: 804 million messages 
Delivery rate: 99.63%
2. Yahoo.com 
Volume: 137 million messages 
Delivery rate: 99.89%
3. Hotmail.com 
Volume: 119 million messages 
Delivery rate: 99.87%
4. AOL.com 
Volume: 31 million messages 
Delivery rate: 99.94%
5. Outlook.com 
Volume: 15 million messages 
Delivery rate: 99.88%
<h2>The average open rate of all emails sent through Kit was 28%.</h2>
Senders often ask how their open rates stack up to others. Truth is, open rates can vary greatly depending on your industry and audience type (B2B vs. freemail addresses, for example). However, here’s a general scale you can use to measure your performance:
<img class="size-full wp-image-26179 aligncenter lazy" data-src="https://media.kit.com/post/XKO97B2M-DEC-19-Sender-Reputation-1.jpg?fm=pjpg" alt="Sender Reputation" width="750" height="508" />
I talk more about open rates and why they aren’t always reliable <a href="https://kit.com/resources/blog/email-deliverability" target="_blank" rel="noopener">in this article.</a>
<h2>Our system-wide complaint rate remained over 10x lower than industry standard</h2>
A complaint is when a subscriber marks a message as spam. An elevated complaint rate is a signal that the sender’s quality of mail isn’t good. We have a team dedicated to ensuring that the mail sent from Kit is wanted by the recipients.
In the email industry, a complaint rate less than 0.1% is seen as healthy. Kit&#8217;s complaint rate in November was 0.008%, which speaks to the high quality of mail sent by our customers and the healthy reputation of our infrastructure.
<blockquote class="blockquote-sm">
<h2>Deliverability tip of the month:</h2>
Start your relationship with subscribers off strong by building a welcome sequence that kicks off as soon as they join your list.
Use this opportunity to help your audience know what to expect from your emails. They can find out how often you’ll be sending, what the content will look like, and how your emails will be providing value to them.
This is also a great time to capture your subscribers’ preferences and interests using <a href="https://kit.com/resources/blog/email-tag-management" target="_blank" rel="noopener">tags</a>! You can use this information to tailor your future emails to better serve your audience.</blockquote>
<h2>Industry news and Kit updates</h2>
<h3>Cyber Monday was our biggest email sending day of the year</h3>
On Black Friday, we sent over 81 million emails and on Cyber Monday we sent over 87 million emails. We maintained a 99% delivery rate throughout the high-volume season.
<h3>I will be speaking at MailCon in January!</h3>
On January 27th, I’ll be joining three other deliverability experts on the panel <a href="https://intercom.help/convertkit/en/articles/2502518-how-to-use-link-triggers" target="_blank" rel="noopener">“The Battle for the Inbox: Under-Used &amp; Effective Deliverability Techniques to Crush the Competition”</a>. I hope to see you there!

Kit’s November 2020 Deliverability Report

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Alyssa Dulin

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Kit’s December 2020 Deliverability Report