How to Lose Email Subscribers in 3 Easy Steps

By Tom Sather

Just like your personal relationships, your customer relationships need a little TLC to maintain. The easiest way to ruin a relationship is to not devote any time or effort to keeping your subscribers happy and satisfied with your email program. Here are three things to watch out for as you look to maintain the relationships you've created with your customers:

Lack of Communication
The quickest way to ruin your email relationship is by not showing up in the inbox. If your content isn't frequently appearing in front of your customers, you're not only losing out on a marketing opportunity, you're also leaving yourself vulnerable to dissatisfied customers who might just take their business elsewhere. Make sure you're tracking your deliverability through your inbox placement rate. By closely monitoring your inbox placement rate, you can react quickly to any drops in inbox placement, protecting your ability to communicate with your customers.

Ignoring Their Feelings
Another easy way to turn off your customers is to ignore them. More than other digital marketing platforms, email allows for a back and forth between marketers and consumers. The way in which a subscriber chooses to interact with each email provides a wealth of data and insight marketers can use to optimize their campaigns to better connect with each subscriber. Is one campaign getting more reads? When and where are complaints coming from? Each action or inaction from your subscribers are signals showing what customers like and don’t like about your program — so pay attention.

Unwilling to Try New Things
What you think is the perfect subject line or best email design may end up falling flat. To protect yourself and your relationships with your customers, get some buy in. The best authority on what your subscribers will engage with isn't your boss, it's your subscribers. Rather than throw a hail mary and pray for the best, try out these different options on a small sample of your subscribers:

Subject Lines: To ensure yours will grab subscriber attention, test different lengths, wording and offers
Design: Test different layouts, calls to action and images to find the most engaging messaging and display.
Frequency: Try out different sending frequencies as well as sending times to determine when your subscribers are most likely to engage.

Don’t miss out on a rewarding relationship with your subscribers by not putting in the time and effort to get to know them. By connecting, listening and adapting to your subscribers’ preferences, you can build a solid email program with engaged customers.

Tom Sather is the senior director of research at Return Path, an email marketing solution that helps to improve your deliverability and return on investment.

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Tom Sather

Tom Sather Author's page Tom Sather is Return Path’s senior director of email research. Tom uses his knowledge of ISPs, spam filters and deliverability rules to advise marketers on how to get their email delivered to the inbox. He began his Return Path career as an email deliverability consultant working with top-brand clients like eBay, MySpace, IBM and Twitter. Tom’s previous experience includes roles with email service provider Experian and on the abuse desks for AOL, Bellsouth, AT&T and GTE.