Email Bounce Rate, BigCommerce

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At a glance

Percentage of customer emails that bounce. High bounce rates damage sender reputation and reduce marketing reach, a damaged sender reputation is a 3-6 month recovery problem, not a quick fix. The card surfaces the share of email sends that fail to deliver so the merchant can spot list-hygiene issues, ESP integration problems, or a sender-reputation crisis early enough to mitigate.

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Calculation

email_bounce_rate (%) = COUNT(email_events WHERE event_type IN ('hard_bounce', 'soft_bounce'))
                       ÷ COUNT(email_events WHERE event_type IN ('sent', 'delivered', 'hard_bounce', 'soft_bounce'))
                       × 100

WHERE event_date IN [today - 30d, today)

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Worked example

1. Current bounce rate is healthy. 4.4% sits below the 5% threshold typical for sender-reputation safety. The store can continue normal sending cadence without imminent deliverability risk.
2. However: the cross-reference signal is worrying. The store has 46.6% unverified emails (unverified_email). If those unverified addresses were sent to in marketing campaigns, the bounce rate would likely jump to 15-20%, well into damaged-reputation territory. The 4.4% reading suggests the merchant is currently suppressing unverified addresses from marketing sends; this is good operational discipline.
3. Decompose the bounce 4.4%:
   • 1.8% hard bounces (5,800 addresses): addresses that don’t exist (typos, abandoned mailboxes, deleted accounts). These addresses should be permanently suppressed from future sends.
   • 2.6% soft bounces (8,420 events): temporary issues (mailbox full, server unavailable). Some addresses will recover; some won’t. Best practice: 3 consecutive soft bounces → move to suppression list.
4. The list-hygiene action. Even at healthy 4.4%, the merchant should:
   • Permanently suppress the 5,800 hard-bouncing addresses in the ESP. Many ESPs do this automatically; verify the setting.
   • Set a 3-strike soft-bounce policy to move repeat soft-bouncers to suppression after 3 consecutive bounces.
   • Run a list-cleanup tool (Kickbox, ZeroBounce, NeverBounce) on the address list quarterly to catch abandoned mailboxes before they bounce.
5. The growth-trap pattern. Bounce rate often stays healthy until the merchant decides to “send to everyone” for a peak-event campaign (BFCM, end-of-season). At that moment, suppressed addresses get included, bounce rate spikes to 15-25%, and sender reputation crashes. Treat the suppression list as sacred, never lift it for short-term volume gain.
6. Recommended response (preventive, not reactive at 4.4%):
   • This week: confirm hard-bounced addresses are permanently suppressed.
   • This week: configure 3-strike soft-bounce policy in the ESP.
   • Month 1: run list-cleanup tool; expect to remove 5-10% of addresses.
   • Month 1: run re-verification campaign on the 46.6% unverified to recover deliverable addresses before they’re ever marketed to.
   • Quarterly: list-hygiene audit; add to operational calendar.
   • Result: bounce rate stays below 3%; sender reputation insulated against future demand spikes.
7. What “alert state” looks like. If next week the bounce rate jumped to 22%:
   • Hour 1: pause all non-transactional sends.
   • Hour 2: identify the campaign that triggered the spike (typically a “send to all” campaign that included unverified addresses).
   • Day 1: re-suppress the affected addresses; do not resume marketing sends until bounce rate drops below 5%.
   • Week 1-4: gradual sending volume rampup with engagement-only segments first.
   • Month 2-6: monitor for sender-reputation recovery; expect Gmail/Outlook deliverability to lag by months.

1. Read bounce rate. Above 5% warrants action; above 20% alert.
2. Decompose hard vs soft.
3. Suppress hard bounces permanently; apply 3-strike to soft.
4. Cross-reference unverified_email for the upstream cause.
5. Set up quarterly list-cleanup as standing hygiene.

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Sibling cards merchants should reference together

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Reconciling against the vendor’s own dashboard

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Known limitations / merchant FAQs

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Tracked live in Vortex IQ Nerve Centre