Auditing Your Email List for Dead Weight

Maintaining a bloated subscriber list filled with unengaged contacts can severely hinder your email marketing performance. Engagement trumps numbers any day. But why purge unengaged subscribers? 1. Enhanced deliverability:  → Email service providers monitor engagement metrics. → A high volume of unopened emails can flag your content as spam, reducing inbox placement. 2. Cost efficiency:  → Many email platforms charge based on subscriber count. → Removing inactive subscribers can lower costs, allowing you to allocate resources more effectively. 3. Accurate analytics:  → A refined list ensures that your open & click-through rates reflect genuine interest, providing clearer insights into campaign performance. Here are a few actionable steps: a. Identify inactivity:  → Define what constitutes an inactive subscriber for your business— e.g., no opens or clicks in the past 90 days. b. Re-engagement campaigns:  → Before removal, attempt to rekindle interest with targeted emails offering value or asking for feedback. c. Regular maintenance:  → Schedule periodic list clean-ups to ensure ongoing engagement & list health. By proactively managing your subscriber list, you: → Protect sender reputation → Enhance engagement → Ensure your messages reach those who truly value them How often do you audit your email list for engagement? Drop your strategies in the comments below.

Your email list isn’t a trophy. It’s a tool. Bigger isn’t always better. If no one’s opening your emails, what’s the point? A bloated list drags your entire campaign down. More spam complaints. Lower open rates. Emails getting buried before they’re even seen. Yet brands hold on. They fear cutting subscribers will hurt them. But the real damage comes from keeping dead weight. One client purged their list. Removed inactive subscribers. Cleaned out the ghosts. Their open rates jumped 15%. Deliverability improved. More real customers saw their emails. This isn’t about shrinking your audience. It’s about making sure the right people stay. Here’s what works. → Remove inactive subscribers regularly. → Segment by engagement levels. → Run re-engagement campaigns before saying goodbye. A smaller, healthier list drives more conversions. And that’s what actually matters. Stop hoarding. Start optimizing. ♻️ Repost if engagement > vanity metrics. ✚ Follow Oliver Allen for expert advice on authentic and transparent marketing strategies. I’m on a mission to set a new standard of honesty in marketing and help brands achieve clarity and results.

"Stop using 2010 marketing tactics in 2025." – Gary Vee Most brands didn’t get the memo. Especially when it comes to email. We just audited a DTC brand doing $5M+ a year. Looked solid from the outside. But under the hood? Bleeding $$ daily. Here’s what we uncovered: • 6,090 cart abandonment emails skipped in 30 days Not delivered. Not delayed. Blocked. One line of flawed logic did it. • Browse abandonment CTR was 1.9% On high-intent traffic. That should be like 8–10%, minimum. It’s not their offer. It’s the setup. • Win-back flow with 0.2% clicks. No suppression strategy. Just dead weight dragging down deliverability. • Flows triggering 1x per lifetime So if I abandon 5 carts over six months, I only get emailed once? • Over 37,000 “ghost” profiles still being emailed. They haven’t clicked or opened in 90 days. Why are they still getting anything? This isn’t poor strategy. This is negligence disguised as email marketing. And it’s costing you more than you think. These aren’t just broken flows. They’re black holes in your retention engine. And most brands (like this one) are leaking tens of thousands in revenue each day because of it. Not because the copy sucks. Not because the design is basic. Not because the segment’s wrong. But because your automations are too dumb to keep up. Here’s the fix: • Rebuild flows to reflect actual buyer behavior • Allow re-entry into high-intent flows • Suppress dead weight fast • Create bridge flows for the grey zone • Stop messaging people who’ve ghosted you for 3+ months If you're still running flows built in 2018? You're not sending email. You're setting money on fire in slow motion.

⚠️ Bigger list ≠ better list Adding more profiles might look like progress, but if a large chunk haven’t engaged in months, what’s really growing? If you’re using a platform like Klaviyo, it’s costing you. Even if you’re not, it’s clouding your numbers with: – Inflated open rates – Misleading engagement – Skewed segmentation logic Growth should be meaningful. Not padded with dead weight. Do this instead: 🧹 Clean your list regularly Don’t wait until deliverability tanks. Build it into your CRM rhythm. 📆 Use re-engagement flows thoughtfully Attempt to re-engage your audience in sporadic intervals. Give them a reason to stay. 📊 Segment by behaviour, not just recency There’s a difference between someone who clicked 6 months ago and someone who never has. 🔍 Define what 'active' really means for you It varies by brand. Make it intentional - don’t just copy benchmarks. 📉 Stop chasing vanity metrics Size means nothing if half your list never opens. 👋 Be willing to let people go Suppress. Move on. Focus your effort where it matters. Not everyone in your list is still your audience. #EmailMarketing #MarketingTips #CRMstrategy #EmailListManagement #Klaviyo

Sharper subject lines, punchier CTA but conversions are still flat. I’ve rewritten more emails at 2am than I care to admit. The problem wasn’t the words → It was the logic Wrong segments. Dead data. Fake personalization Turns out, pretty words don’t fix the wrong message So I built a process that starts with diagnosis, not copy. Here’s Our 3-step blueprint: 1. Review the data (and the plumbing) We pull the metrics most agencies ignore: • Click-to-open rates by segment • Dead-weight % (unengaged + bounces) • Deliverability configs (SPF, DKIM, DMARC) Most email issues aren’t creative → They’re clogged pipes. 2. Personalization teardown + segmentation logic check We run what I call the “Is this really personalized?” test: • Is it behavior based or just {first_name}? • Are dynamic blocks firing where they should? • Is the segment logic too broad or worse, not relevant? We tweak just enough to tighten impact. → No bloated “AI hyper-segmentation” here 3. A/B test strategy: build, don't spray Most folks “test subject lines” and call it strategy. We build an actual testing roadmap: • Prioritized personalization levers (not just buttons) • Test durations tied to audience size • Measured not guessed Each test gets a hypothesis → Each win gets a playbook. This audit isn’t magic → It’s process. It shows you exactly where you’re leaking revenue → and how to plug it. Want this audit done for your brand? Comment "TEARDOWN" to Book a call  and let’s fix it together

The biggest threat to your email revenue is dead weight. Here’s how it happens: - You run giveaways, collabs, lead ads - Your list size balloons - Your open rate tanks - Gmail starts filtering you - You start sending to ghosts Fix this before it breaks your account: The 2X2 Hygiene Grid: Segment your list into: 1. Engaged buyers 2. Unengaged buyers 3. Engaged non buyers 4. Unengaged non buyers Now treat each group like its own customer journey. Group 1 → Keep nurturing. Send full flows + campaigns. Group 2 → Send survey style emails: “Still using X? Still happy?” Group 3 → Send strong product education & offers Group 4 → Re-permission or sunset fast Your job is to email the right people.

High perceived value doesn't guarantee email engagement. And this creates one of email marketing's most overlooked challenges. Many marketers get deliverability strategy right: → Segment by engagement → Suppress non-openers after 30-90 days → Protect sender reputation Smart move. Keep doing this. But... the nuance: Subscribers go through "seasons" of engagement. Someone can assign massive value to your emails while going months without opening a single one. Why this happens: → Life priorities shift (new job, family changes, health issues) → Inbox overwhelm leads to "batch processing" behavior → They're consuming your content on other channels → Seasonal business cycles affect attention patterns → Mental bandwidth fluctuates with stress levels Don't assume silence = disinterest. Silence is often = circumstance. Most brands: Write them off as "dead weight." What smart brands do: Recognize the difference between seasonal disengagement and true disinterest. The strategy: → Yes, suppress for deliverability (non-negotiable) → But treat suppressed segments as "dormant," not "dead" → Run bi-annual re-engagement campaigns to these segments → Use different messaging that acknowledges the time gap → Test various content formats to break through the noise The bottom line: Protect your deliverability with proper suppression. But don't write off subscribers going through a season of unengagement. How do you handle subscribers who stop engaging but might still find value in your content?

Founder learnings part 10 - how to get world class email open rates in 5 easy steps! 6 months ago we knew nothing about email - now we send more than 100k emails per week and have maintained a 67% open rate for the last 3 months straight (industry standard is 18%) while holding sub 0.3% spam rate in postmaster. Here's what I wish I'd known 6 months ago, all manual builds + no klaviyo! : 1️ - Mail warming actually matters way less than you think in 2025 - because your score is way more linked to the domain/IP combo than just the domain, so, if you're using a 3rd party mail warmer and then switch across to klaviyo or some other sending tool, it basically won't matter - you've lost the score rep you built on the warmer. This is why we roll our own. 2 - Every send should be transactional: As in - every email you send should be triggered based on user interactions within your ecosystem, no cold-sending. Hitting their inbox at the exact moment they’re most likely to engage makes all the difference, put hooks all over your site/app/extension/anywhere else you can, watch for form entries, then trigger sends based on that - WAY better than blasting 100k out all at once from something like mailchimp. 3 - Pre-check for bounces – Sending to invalid emails hurts your sender reputation and increases spam filtering. Use services that check if an email will bounce before you send it, so you’re only reaching valid inboxes. This keeps your list clean and improves long-term deliverability. 4 - Prune your cohorts – This one should be obvious but most email lists have dead weight that drag down performance. Set up automated scripts to constantly remove unresponsive users and refine targeting based on engagement levels. The more dialed-in your segments are, the higher your open rates will be. 5 - Ramp sends REALLY slowly – There is no way around this. Even if your list is solid, blasting too many emails too fast will tank your deliverability, you have to be so slow and steady with this. Industry standards say 15% per day but we go slower and have done 8-10% on warmed domains to avoid spam filters. A slow, steady ramp ensures you build sender trust and maximize inbox placement.

Your sender reputation isn’t decided by Gmail. It’s decided by your subscribers. And right now, they’re voting you into spam. Too many marketers assume polished templates and clean copy will land them in the inbox. But filters don’t care about appearances. Most marketers miss this: Filters care about reactions. If subscribers: - ignore - delete, - or never engage, mailbox providers read that as: “This sender doesn’t matter!” Your list exposes you faster than anything else. This is the silent killer of your email ROI! And it will tank your deliverability no matter how good your content is. Here’s what to do: • Audit your list • Cut bad data and cold subscribers • Segment what’s left by role accounts, business inboxes, freemail domains, signup sources • Send your next email only to your most engaged segment That small reset tells filters your emails matter again. I’ve seen senders go from spam-folder purgatory to inbox placement in days without touching a subject line. And the speed of that shift always shocks them… So stop guessing. And start testing the right things. Deliverability will get a lot simpler. If your sender rep feels stuck, DM me. I’ll help you spot what’s dragging you down and fix it.