What is a “click” event and how is it recorded?
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When a subscriber clicks a link in your email, they usually don't go directly to your website. They go to your ESP's tracking server first.
Here's what happens: every tracked link in your email is replaced by a redirect URL. Something like click.mailchimp.com/track/click?..., or a custom tracking domain if you've set one up. When someone clicks, that URL is requested, the ESP logs the click event, and then the subscriber is forwarded to the actual destination. The whole thing happens in milliseconds.
The click event that gets logged includes:
- Which email and campaign the click came from
- Which specific link was clicked
- When it happened (timestamp)
- IP address and device info
That last piece matters more than you might think. Security scanners and link-preview bots also follow links, and they do it right after delivery, before any human has had a chance to open the email. ESPs try to filter these out using bot detection heuristics, but some slip through. If you see a spike in clicks immediately at send time with no corresponding conversions or sessions in your analytics, that's usually scanners, not real readers.
Understanding the mechanics helps when you're debugging unusual click data. If you want to go deeper on what those numbers actually mean, our guide to click-through rate covers how to interpret them. And if you're seeing inflated clicks you can't explain, read about how bots inflate click counts.
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