{"id":3620,"date":"2021-09-23T08:27:44","date_gmt":"2021-09-23T08:27:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2021\/09\/23\/apple-mail-privacy-protection-is-here-what-this-means-for-email-marketers\/"},"modified":"2025-06-10T07:40:08","modified_gmt":"2025-06-10T07:40:08","slug":"apple-mail-privacy-protection-is-here-what-this-means-for-email-marketers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2021\/09\/23\/apple-mail-privacy-protection-is-here-what-this-means-for-email-marketers\/","title":{"rendered":"Apple Mail Privacy Protection Is Here \u2013 What This Means for Email Marketers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"lead\">In June, Apple announced a new feature for their Mail app on iOS15 \u2013 Mail Privacy Protection.<\/span><br \/>\n<span class=\"lead\">According to Apple:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><em><span class=\"lead\">\u201cMail Privacy Protection stops senders from using invisible pixels to collect information about the user. [It prevents] senders from knowing when they open an email, and masks their IP address so it can\u2019t be linked to other online activity or used to determine their location.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<h2>How Mail Privacy Protection Works<\/h2>\n<p>When a user opens up the Apple Mail app after updating their software to iOS15, they\u2019ll get a message prompting them to either \u201cProtect Mail activity\u201d or \u201cDon\u2019t protect Mail activity.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-16640\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Mail-Privacy-Protection.png\" alt=\"Mail Privacy Protection\" width=\"298\" height=\"641\"><\/p>\n<p>Mail Privacy Protection will not be turned on by default \u2013 users will have to opt in or out by making a choice. Apple\u2019s App Tracking Transparency tool shows us that there is just a 4% opt-in to ad tracking. Based on these numbers, and the language used by Apple for protecting mail, it is estimated we will see similar low opt-in rates for this email setting.<br \/>\nBefore serving an email to a user, Apple will route emails through a proxy server to pre-load message content. This includes tracking pixels which are used to track opens. Regardless of whether a user actually opens or not, an open will be trigged by the way Mail Privacy Protection works.<\/p>\n<h2>What Does This Mean for Marketers?<\/h2>\n<p>If your audience has a significant amount of Apple Mail users, your open rates will be overinflated with the launch of iOS15.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-16644\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/Mail-Hides.png\" alt=\"\"><\/p>\n<p>When it comes to tracking and reporting, you will not be able to see:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Which Apple Mail recipients open emails<\/li>\n<li>Open times<\/li>\n<li>Geolocation data<\/li>\n<li>Device used to open<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>As well as being a key performance indicator for <a href=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/services\/email-marketing\/\">email marketing<\/a> reporting, the open rate is also used for a number of email related activities.<\/p>\n<h2>Evaluate Your Current Email Marketing Activities<\/h2>\n<p>Make sure you audit your current activity, especially where you are relying on opens for reporting or automated triggers.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"pink\"><strong>Automated nurture flow triggers<\/strong> <\/span>\u2013 are any of your triggers based on opens? These will need to be re-worked.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"pink\"><strong>Segmentation for re-engagement campaigns<\/strong> <\/span>\u2013 are you using opens as a way of pulling unengaged contacts? Consider other metrics such as the last click, last purchase or browse. Also review your copy in re-engagement campaigns for wording such as \u201cit has been a while since you last opened an email\u201d.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"pink\"><strong>Send time optimisation<\/strong><\/span> \u2013 many ESPs allow you to select the best send time for your audience based on open rate data (amongst other data). Again, this data will be inaccurate. Re-work campaigns that use AI features to send emails at the most optimal send time.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"pink\"><strong>Content localisation<\/strong><\/span> \u2013 are you using content that is pulled from geolocation data? If you use IP data to identify geolocation for your users and then use this within email (e.g., your nearest store), this could again be inaccurate.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"pink\"><strong>Identifying A\/B test winners<\/strong><\/span> \u2013 consider switching to click rates for determining split test winners, rather than relying on open rates.<\/p>\n<h2>Broaden Your Email Metrics and Reporting<\/h2>\n<p>If open rates are a big focus in your reporting, now is the time to broaden your email marketing analytics. Focus on other available KPIs, such as click to open rates, click rates against delivered emails, and other cross-channel metrics which show audience engagement such as browse behaviour or orders placed.<\/p>\n<p><strong>To find out how we can help, why not give Coast Digital a <span class=\"pink\">call on 0845 450 2086<\/span>. Our specialists are experienced in helping clients to find the true value of campaigns, getting them well on the way to meeting their business goals.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In June, Apple announced a new feature for their Mail app on iOS15 \u2013 Mail Privacy Protection. According to Apple: \u201cMail Privacy Protection stops senders from using invisible pixels to&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":3621,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[115],"tags":[],"related_service":[47,65,71],"related_industry":[],"class_list":["post-3620","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-email-marketing"],"acf":[],"card":"<article class=\"wp-component-card wp-component-card--dark wp-component-card--resource wp-component-card--post wp-component-card--full-width            wp-component-card--link js-card-link\n        \">\n            <div class=\"wp-component-card__image\">\n            <img width=\"456\" height=\"566\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Apple-Mail-Featured.jpeg\" class=\"attachment-card-1-col size-card-1-col\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Apple-Mail-Featured.jpeg 456w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Apple-Mail-Featured-242x300.jpeg 242w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Apple-Mail-Featured-200x248.jpeg 200w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Apple-Mail-Featured-81x100.jpeg 81w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/Apple-Mail-Featured-32x40.jpeg 32w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 456px) 100vw, 456px\" \/>        <\/div>\n        <div class=\"wp-component-card__content\">\n        <div class=\"wp-component-card__content-top\">\n                                                    <p class=\"wp-component-card__eyebrow\">\n                    Blog                <\/p>\n                        <a href='https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2021\/09\/23\/apple-mail-privacy-protection-is-here-what-this-means-for-email-marketers\/'>\n        <h2 class='wp-component-card__title'>\n            Apple Mail Privacy Protection Is Here \u2013 What This Means for Email Marketers\n        <\/h2>\n    <\/a>        <\/div>\n                    <div class=\"wp-component-card__content-bottom\">\n                                    <p class=\"wp-component-card__description\">\n                        In June, Apple announced a new feature for their Mail app on iOS15 \u2013 Mail Privacy Protection. According to Apple: \u201cMail Privacy Protection stops senders from using invisible pixels to&hellip;                    <\/p>\n                                                                    <div class=\"wp-component-card__meta\">\n                                                    <p class=\"wp-component-card__date\">\n                                23 September 2021                            <\/p>\n                                                                            <div class=\"wp-component-card__terms\">\n                                                                                            <div class=\"wp-component-tags__tag\">\n                Digital Marketing            <\/div>\n                                <div class=\"wp-component-tags__tag\">\n                Email Marketing            <\/div>\n                                <div class=\"wp-component-tags__tag\">\n                Privacy            <\/div>\n                                                                                                            <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n            <\/div>\n<\/article>\n","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3620","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3620"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3620\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3621"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3620"},{"taxonomy":"related_service","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/related_service?post=3620"},{"taxonomy":"related_industry","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/related_industry?post=3620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}