We’ve all been there. It’s hard to say goodbye to the subscribers you lose from time to time. Your efforts to bring in contacts and nurture them are commendable, but if you feel a pang every time a contact unsubscribes from your emails, you need to read this—unsubscribes do more good for your brand than you think.
What happens when someone unsubscribes?
When a contact no longer wants to receive your emails, their only source of separation is the unsubscribe button or the link you provide in your emails. And as soon as someone unsubscribes, they stop communicating with you.
Why would someone unsubscribe?
A large mailing list doesn’t ensure everyone is interested in your brand or your emails will fetch the highest open rates. Most often than not, even your biggest mailing lists suffer unsubscribe attacks. There are many reasons for contacts to unsubscribe from you:
Their areas of interest have changed over time
They don’t want to hear updates from you
They prefer a competitor’s offers
They aren’t sure what they subscribed to
They feel like you’re spamming them
And while all you’re obliged to do is accept their decision to opt out, it can actually be good for your brand in the long run. There are some rather surprising truths that should make you look at unsubscribes differently.
Promotes responsible marketing
The best part about email marketing is its ability to go well with the email marketing regulations that bind it. With all the stringent security around customer data collection and processing, unsubscribes help you not only comply with the laws but also respect a recipient’s decision to end their line of communication.
This ultimately guides you to permission-based marketing—the act of being transparent about your email marketing motives, helping recipients find value in your engagement, and then confidently adding them to your address books.
Improves list hygiene
Don’t sweat the diminishing numbers—instead, check how healthy your mailing list is, upon every email-opt-out flush. Sometimes, people unsubscribe for good, and these may be the ones who don’t acknowledge your brand and the offerings. Also, with spam complaints from uninterested parties, and bounces from incorrect email addresses, it’s better to get these entries off your list—and then watch your bounce and spam rates plummet.
Measure your email marketing success by counting the genuine contacts, not the congested inboxes and indifferent recipients.
Unearths valuable information
With every unsubscribe, you can learn more about your contacts’ preferences. Make sure to collect feedback or their reason for opting out, as you can always work on those your contacts state as your weak points.
The information you collect before people leave can help you know your contacts’ issues, and prevent future miscommunication and irrelevant engagement on your brand’s end. Take a look at how to easily get this done using Zoho Campaigns.
Bonus: A good prevention technique is to constantly help your audience to revisit their email interests. Allow them to choose what they want to receive with Zoho Campaigns’ subscription preferences options.
Saves on energy and costs
Setting up an email, workflow, or even a segmented mailing list is a tedious job, and needs to be done right for a smooth email marketing process. Unsubscribes simplify your job, helping you channel your energy and time into things that need more attention. You no longer have to expend energy and then watch it go into the drain—eventually, since only interested contacts remain in your list, you’ll have a highly-targeted reach with healthy open rates.
Refocuses your brand strategy
Maybe sending four campaigns per week didn’t work; the audience segment you targeted was too generic; workflows weren’t dynamic enough—these are some things to reflect on after every opt-out. Once you identify what didn’t work for your brand, or what has gone wrong, you can rebuild your campaign strategy and rework your email-sending patterns.
So, let go of the thought that email unsubscribes are always harmful for your brand. They hurt your short-term performance, but they’re stepping stones to efficient email marketing techniques and better communication with your audience. Use some of the best practices suggested here to keep track of your unsubscribes—and stayed tuned for more myths to be debunked by the Zoho Campaigns team!
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