Unsubscribes Happen

Does your Marketing email contain the same message over and over again, sending to the same list of people, over and over again?  Most likely, your message changes, with fresh content and the right call to action, ideally the call to action will get the right response from your list subscribers.

The right response doesn’t include unsubscribing, but unsubscribes happen. You can’t stop them so why make it difficult when someone is saying “I want off you list”.

Most people will generally opt-out of permission email for the same reasons:

1. Your Messages Lack relevance
2. You send too often
3. Your recipient wants to receive your newsletter at a different email address.  The only way they know how to do this is unsubscribe with their current address and opt-in with their new email address.

What is the best way to allow someone to unsubscribe?

1. Maybe you don’t have to.  Offer a preference page as an option to unsubscribing.  If your subscriber simply wants to change their email address or reduce the frequency of your emails, make it easy for them: let them manage their account settings.
2. Make it easy to unsubscribe.  Don’t bury your unsubscribe information in your email messages, make it prominent, easy to find.  It’s also a bad idea to hide the unsubscribe instructions in the email header – you want them to remember the good experience they had as a subscriber to your newsletter.
3. Do not make your subscriber login to unsubscribe.  Why should they have to go through the hassle of logging in, remembering a password to get out of something they no longer want?
4. Try to find out why they are leaving.  Make feedback an option, but not a compulsory option.
5. After they unsubscribe email a confirmation. It’s in good form to say Thank You or Goodbye, and you will maintain your professional relationship with them.
6. Don’t keep them guessing when their address will be removed.  Let them know when their address will be removed.  I don’t recommend waiting ten days to remove their email address; they want to leave, let them, besides, software, makes the unsubscribe automatic. So should I say don’t add them back to your list for the next 10 days.
7. Do not require a series of clicks to opt-out of emails.  Two clicks should be the max.
8. Test your unsubscribe link:  Make sure it works.
9. Keep the unsubscribe landing page updated.  It may be the last time they interact with your business so you will want to have this page compatible with the rest of your website.

   Unsubscribes Happen

In summary, do not make a subscriber work to unsubscribe. You decide how this is set:  feedback, two clicks or just a link, the bottom line is just graciously let them go.