New laws in France and Italy require explicit consent for open tracking. However, this won't kill the metric. Marketers will use the data from the statistically significant group of users who consent to tracking to make directional decisions, like A/B test winners, and extrapolate those findings to their entire audience.
Reported open rates are inherently flawed due to inflation from bots and privacy features like Apple's. Their true value isn't the absolute number, but their utility as a directional metric. Use them to compare relative performance in A/B tests (e.g., subject lines) rather than as a definitive measure of campaign success.
Despite stricter email tracking laws emerging in Europe, similar federal legislation is highly unlikely in the United States soon. The absence of major federal email laws since CAN-SPAM and the overall difficulty in passing privacy-related legislation mean US marketers will continue to operate in a different, more fragmented regulatory environment.
Reddit ads are identified as a high-performing and overlooked opportunity for marketers. The recent introduction of split testing capabilities for ad variants makes the platform an even more powerful and measurable channel, suggesting that advertisers should reconsider it as a key part of their media mix.