Why Email Lists Become Disconnected

Unsubscribe rates climbing? It's time to take a hard look at your email strategy. High unsubscribe rates are often a sign that your emails aren’t meeting your audience’s expectations. The good news? It's never too late to turn things around. Let's make a plan together... WHY SUBSCRIBERS LEAVE 1. Too Many Promotions If you're constantly pushing for more commitments, your brand starts to feel like an overly aggresive salesperson. 2. Irrelevant Content If your emails don’t resonate with your audience’s needs or interests, they’re going to disengage. 3. Lack of Value People want to feel like they’re gaining something—whether it’s education, inspiration, or a good deal. Without value, they’ll disengage. 4. Inconsistent Sending When it comes to email, absence does not make the heart grow fonder. Subscribers can't feel connected to your brand if your sending cadence is sparse or erratic. HOW TO IMPROVE RETENTION 1. Set (& Deliver On!) Clear Expectations Use your welcome email to let subscribers know what kind of content they’ll receive and how often. Then, stick to it. 2. Offer a Preference Center Allow subscribers to choose how often they hear from you and what topics they’re interested in. This reduces unnecessary unsubscribes. 3. Make Every Email Valuable Before you hit send, ask: Does this email educate, entertain, or solve a problem for my audience? If the answer is no, revise your email to be a little more customer-centric and a little less self-serving. 4. Segment Your Audience Group subscribers by behavior, interests, or demographics. Personalized emails are more relevant –– and relevancy keeps people engaged. 5. Re-Engage Inactive Subscribers Send targeted campaigns to win back disengaged subscribers. If they still don’t engage, remove them to keep your list clean and your reporting accurate. Unsubscribes aren’t always a bad thing—they can improve your deliverability and leave you with a more engaged audience. What we want to avoid, though, is losing qualified prospects because our messaging was misaligned or our customer experience was sub-par. Focus on the three pillars of effective email marketing: → Relevance → Value → Consistency If you can send valuable emails with content that's relevant to the recipient on a consistent basis, you're going to build a list of loyal subscribers who actually look forward to your emails. Need help installing this in your business? Drop me a comment or a DM. I'll be happy to take a look at your current set-up and recommend a few high impact adjustments you can make.

Most deliverability issues boil down to bad data. Either you’re sending to people you shouldn't, or you’re sending things the right people don’t care about. Here's what might be contributing to your issue… First, the most common list growth missteps: 💌 Not getting explicit permission at signup. I’m not talking about what legally counts as an opt-in… for example, acquiring a list of “opt-in” addresses from a partner or affiliate. If they’re not aware of the fact that your brand will be emailing them, just don’t do it. 💌 Not clearly setting expectations. They should know exactly what they’re signing up for before they submit their address. And ideally, you follow up with a welcome email that reinforces who you are and why you’re in their inbox. Then you stick to what you promised! If you haven’t defined re-engagement or sunset policies yet, skip ahead to Step 6 — it walks you through how to build them. 💌 Not validating email addresses at the point of entry. Sometimes, even the most legitimate brands pull in trash signups… perhaps because they’re running a sweepstakes that entices people to share disposable email addresses. Or their form isn’t protected with a CAPTCHA (or similar line of defense against bot signups). Quick plug for real-time email verification if you’re collecting a LOT of addresses and delivery rates are often below ~95%. 💌 Sending mail that’s disconnected from what they signed up for. For example, if your last sweepstakes attracted people who only wanted a free iPad, not your content. Keep it relevant to what you’ll be emailing them about, people! Email is about quality, not quantity. Now on to common flaws in list management: 💌 Changing your frequency or volume without warning. Mailbox providers like consistency. When they notice changes in recipient reaction or sending volume, they’re likely to figure you’ve been hacked (and someone else is running amok with your sender reputation), or you’re doing something squirrely (in which case, well, maybe you don’t deserve the inbox anymore). 💌 Sending infrequently (e.g. once every 6 months). This one’s also a red flag for mailbox providers since they don’t have enough recent sending history to know if you’re safe for their users. Not to mention, recipients may forget about you, making them more likely to mark your emails as spam. 💌 Not acting on engagement data. You’ve gotta pay attention to your positive engagement signals (e.g. opens and clicks) and the negative ones (e.g. marking your email as spam or unsubscribing) to ensure you’re only sending to people who actually want to hear from you. Suppressing people who’ve asked to get off the ride isn’t just good for deliverability… it’s also legally required in a lot of parts of the world. 💌 Not having a re-engagement or sunset policy. Want to know what ‘unengaged’ should mean for your brand, or how to build re-engagement flows? Check out my most recent blog post for Send It Right.