How do I track opens, clicks, and engagement in sequences?

Unify tracks email opens and link clicks at the per-enrollment level, and surfaces aggregate engagement metrics on every sequence. This article covers what's tracked, how to filter contacts by engagement, and the most common reasons tracking numbers look wrong.

What's tracked

For every email sent through a sequence, Unify records:

• Opens — counted when the recipient loads the tracking pixel.

• Clicks — counted when the recipient clicks a tracked link.

• Replies — any reply received to the sent email.

Aggregate metrics (open rate, click rate, reply rate) are shown on the sequence overview. Per-contact engagement is available in the sequence's Enrollments tab and on each person's record under their email activity.

How to filter contacts by engagement

To build a follow-up list of people who opened or clicked but didn't reply, use Audience filters:

1. Go to Audiences and create a new audience.

2. Add filters: - Sequence = the sequence you care about - Email activity → Opened = true (or Open count > N for repeat openers) - Replied = false (if you want non-repliers)

3. Optionally add Last opened at = within the last X days for recency.

4. Optionally exclude Unsubscribed, Bounced, and Do not email = true for follow-up-ready leads.

The same approach works for clicks — use Click count > 0 or Last clicked at as the filter.

Why click rate or open rate might show as zero

A few well-known causes:

Tracking pixel was blocked

Some email clients (especially in Apple Mail with privacy protection enabled, or in corporate environments with image proxying) load the tracking pixel through a proxy or block it entirely. This produces apparent zero opens even when the email was opened.

Tracked links weren't clicked

Click rate is only zero if recipients aren't clicking the links you've added. If your email has no links, click rate will always be zero.

Tracking was disabled on the sequence

Open and click tracking are configured per sequence. Check the sequence settings:

• Sequence → Settings → Tracking — confirm Open Tracking and Click Tracking are enabled.

If either was disabled when emails were sent, the corresponding metric for those sends will be zero regardless of recipient behavior.

Test sends from your own mailbox

If you're testing a sequence by sending to yourself, opens from the same mailbox that sent the email may not be counted reliably depending on tracking setup. Self-opens can also inflate counts when the sender opens their own sent email. For clean tracking metrics, avoid opening tracked emails from the sending mailbox.

Recent sends — tracking may lag

Aggregate metrics update on a short delay (typically a few minutes). Very recent sends may not yet reflect in the dashboard. Wait 15–30 minutes before assuming zero is accurate.

Caveats worth knowing

• Opens are directional, not exact. Email-client behavior, image proxying, and preview panes all affect open counts. Treat opens as a relative signal between cohorts, not as an absolute count of "people who read this."

• Click counts are more reliable than opens because they require an explicit user action.

• Replies are the most reliable engagement signal — they're hard to fake and indicate real interest.

For follow-up campaigns, lean on clicks + replies rather than opens when filtering down to high-intent contacts.