3 Reasons Unsubscribes Can Be Good for Your Email Marketing

It’s not personal. Losing email subscribers is going to happen. In fact, those email unsubscribes may actually be good for your marketing – and your business. Here are three reasons why.

Email Unsubscribes = Automatic Email List Cleaning

It might not be fun, but keeping a clean house is a necessity – and the same is true of your email list. The bottom line is that poor data quality can impact your email marketing ROI. A poor quality list can hurt your reputation as a sender, cost you money, obscure your results and even get you blacklisted by ISPs as a spammer. So let those unsubscribes be the kick in the pants you need to keep up with your email list cleaning chores.

How often you should clean your list depends on how often you mail and how many new subscribers you are adding. Generally speaking, you should clean new data as it comes in, and you should re-check any emails that have not been mailed in 60 to 90 days.

Email Unsubscribes are an Opportunity to Learn

Don’t just take those email unsubscribes at face value. Take a moment to dig a little deeper and find out why the customer doesn’t want to hear from you.

In a recent Custora study, the most common reasons behind email unsubscribes include:

• Too frequent (67%)
• Too generic, not personalized (63%)
• Not relevant (60%)
• Not interested in purchasing anything (55%)

Custora suggests a simple formula to remedy these complaints: Timing + relevancy = happier customers.

The first step to knowing what your customers want is to optimize your email preference center. This allows subscribers to control the frequency and channels in which they communicate with you.

Second, make sure your unsubscribe process includes a short questionnaire that asks customers why they are leaving, and – more importantly – allows customers to change their preferences rather than unsubscribe altogether. Soliciting and assessing customer feedback in this way gives you the opportunity to continually improve your strategy and ultimately increase customer engagement and satisfaction.

Email Unsubscribes Let You Put Your Strategy into Perspective

As we’ve said, it’s easy to get caught up in numbers. And big, impressive email lists certainly command a lot of attention. But putting those big numbers into the proper perspective can help.

First of all, HubSpot says that as much as 25 percent of your email list attrition may simply be due to such natural causes as employee turnover – rather than any dissatisfaction with your emails.

Furthermore, Jay Baer, of Convince and Convert, suggests you view your unsubscribe data through a financial lens. Review your unsubscribe list and attach a dollar value of all prior purchases made by each address. Chances are good the unsubscribers were not highly engaged, highly motivated customers anyway. So rather than worry about what you’re losing with unsubscribes, your data may suggest you’ll actually end up saving both time and resources by being able to focus your energies on those customers who are ready to buy from you.

At the end of the day, email marketing is a big-picture strategy. So don’t take email unsubscribes personally. Instead, remind yourself why you’re email marketing in the first place: to build relationships with those customers who love your brand.

Learn how you can take your email marketing list to the next level! Download our free guide today!