Open and click tracking explained (should I enable tracking?)

Open tracking tells you when someone probably opened your email. Click tracking tells you which links people clicked. Both are optional in Distro and off by default, because they add technical pieces to every email that can slightly lower deliverability. Turn them on when the data is worth that trade-off.

How open tracking works

When open tracking is on, Distro adds a tiny invisible image to the end of each email. When the recipient's email app loads images, it requests that image from Distro, and Distro records an open.

This has real limits:

• Images turned off in the recipient's app means no open is recorded, even if they read it.
• Gmail loads images through its own image proxy when the person opens the email. Distro counts those as opens.
• Apple Mail Privacy Protection and some other privacy proxies can load images without anyone reading the email. Distro keeps these out of its open counts.
• Security scanners at companies can fetch images automatically. Distro filters known scanners and implausibly fast opens.

A reply, or a human click, also counts as proof the email was opened. Treat open numbers as an estimate, not a fact.

How click tracking works

When click tracking is on, Distro rewrites each web link in your email so it first passes through a Distro tracking address, records the click, then immediately redirects to your original link. The destination stays exactly the same.

• Unsubscribe links, email (mailto:) and phone (tel:) links are never rewritten.
• Security scanners that "click" every link are filtered out where Distro can recognise them.
• Tracking links use Distro's own address. Distro does not currently support a custom tracking domain.

How tracking can affect deliverability

• The tracking image is a remote image from a different domain than yours.
• Rewritten links point to a different domain than your own, behind a redirect. Spam filters look at link domains, and a mismatch between the visible link and the real destination adds risk.
• Together they make a plain, personal email look a little more like bulk marketing.

The effect varies and is often small, but for cold outreach every signal counts.

Should you turn tracking on?

Many cold emailers judge campaigns on replies alone and leave tracking off.

Where to turn tracking on or off

• Email campaigns: open the campaign and use the Track emails switch in the Settings panel. It turns open and click tracking on or off together.
• Email + LinkedIn campaigns: use the Track emails switch in the campaign's Settings. It's off by default, and it only feeds the results: it never decides what is sent.
• Compose (one-off emails): use the separate Track opens and Track clicks switches.
• Workspace defaults: Outreach settings (in the sidebar, below the divider) has Track opens and Track link clicks under Open & click tracking, both off unless you turn them on. New email campaigns and Compose emails start from these defaults; Email + LinkedIn campaigns don't. Always confirm the switch on the campaign itself before you launch, since that is what the campaign uses.

Where to see the results

Opens and clicks appear in each campaign and on Analytics as Opened and Clicked. In an Email + LinkedIn campaign with tracking off, Opened only counts people who replied. In Outreach settings, Show rates as a share of lets you choose whether rates are calculated against emails sent (accepted by Google), emails likely delivered, or people emailed.