{"id":1926,"date":"2026-08-10T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-08-10T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/?p=1926"},"modified":"2026-08-10T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2026-08-10T00:00:00","slug":"the-email-number-you-should-stop-celebrating","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/2026\/08\/10\/the-email-number-you-should-stop-celebrating\/","title":{"rendered":"The email number you should stop celebrating"},"content":{"rendered":"

Welcome back to this week’s Side Income Roundup<\/strong>, Monday, August 10.<\/p>\n

The number most of us check first turns out to be close to useless, and there’s a Google Ads change landing on the 17th that costs you money if you leave it alone.<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udce7 Why the open rate you’re proud of might be hiding your best email
\n\ud83d\udee0 Turn one product photo into a ready-to-post video
\n\ud83d\udd0d Fix the site search that’s quietly losing you sales
\n\u26a1 A Google Ads deadline on August 17 worth beating
\n\ud83e\udd16 The affiliate AI rule that can claw back your commissions<\/p>\n

Let’s get into it.<\/p>\n

\n

THIS WEEK’S BIG IDEA<\/h2>\n

\ud83d\udce2 Open rate is a vanity metric<\/a><\/p>\n

Opens only tell you a subject line got attention. They say nothing about whether the email made you money.<\/p>\n

Email consultant Nabeel Azeez makes the case that proper segmentation lets you mail far more often without burning your list, with one of his clients sending upwards of eight emails a day to different segments while most brands manage three a week. And before you delete your dormant subscribers, about 10% of them come back through a reactivation campaign.<\/p>\n

Our Take:<\/em><\/strong> Pull up your last ten email sends and rank them by revenue instead of opens. If your best earner had a weak open rate, you’ve been optimizing the wrong number.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

TOOLS OF THE WEEK<\/h2>\n

\ud83d\udee0 Vmake Labs Brainrot Marketing video styles<\/a>
\nUpload one product photo, pick a Brainrot, UGC, or TV-ad template, and it builds a ready-to-post TikTok, Reels, or Shorts video in seconds.<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udd0d SearchUs for WordPress<\/a>
\nRanks search results properly across your posts, pages, and WooCommerce products, and turns dead 404 pages into related-content suggestions.<\/p>\n

Our Take:<\/em><\/strong> Run your three best-selling product photos through Vmake this week. Post one a day to TikTok and see which format actually pulls clicks.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

TODAY’S QUICK WINS<\/h2>\n

\u26a1 Google clarifies its Smart Bidding update after advertiser pushback<\/a>
\nFrom August 17, budget-limited Target CPA and Target ROAS campaigns get pushed to hit the target you set rather than beat it. <\/p>\n

\u26a1 Instagram now lets you swap the music on old posts<\/a>
\nReplace Audio sits in the three-dot menu on any published post, video, or carousel, and keeps every like, comment, and share the post already earned.<\/p>\n

Our Take:<\/em><\/strong> Tighten the target on any budget-limited campaign that’s beating it before the 17th, or Google will spend the difference. Then fix the audio on your best post instead of reposting it.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

FROM OMC<\/h2>\n

\ud83d\udcdd 112 Days to Black Friday: The 20-Minute Audit That Could Save Your Q4<\/a><\/p>\n

August is the last quiet month before Q4 gets busy, and most sellers spend it guessing at what to fix.<\/p>\n

Our Take:<\/em><\/strong> Block twenty minutes this week and run the audit. Finding your real bottleneck now and fixing it beats doing it when it’s more expensive later.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

AI SPOTLIGHT<\/h2>\n

\ud83e\udd16 TikTok Shop’s AI videos are putting affiliate trust under pressure<\/a><\/p>\n

AI-generated product videos are flooding an affiliate program with 11.3 million selling creators globally, and TikTok permits them only with clear disclosure and no altered product claims. <\/p>\n

Our Take:<\/em><\/strong> Before you let AI make your next product video, open the brand’s affiliate terms and check its AI rules. Some programs are already clawing back commissions.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

UNTIL NEXT WEEK…<\/h2>\n

Here’s your move this week:<\/p>\n

\u2705 Rank your last ten emails by revenue, not opens
\n\u2705 Turn three product photos into short videos
\n\u2705 Tighten your Google Ads targets before August 17
\n\u2705 Check the AI rules in every affiliate program you promote<\/p>\n

Talk soon,
\nAidan<\/p>\n

P.S. If Q4 already feels close, that audit takes twenty minutes and tells you where to aim.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Opens feel good, but they don’t pay you. Plus a Google Ads change on August 17 that quietly raises your cost per sale.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1926","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-letter"],"rttpg_featured_image_url":null,"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"Aidan","author_link":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/author\/admin_omc\/"},"rttpg_comment":0,"rttpg_category":"Newsletter<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"Opens feel good, but they don't pay you. Plus a Google Ads change on August 17 that quietly raises your cost per sale.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1926","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1926"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1926\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1927,"href":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1926\/revisions\/1927"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onlinemarketingclassroom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}