Just like spring cleaning, while it may not be fun at the time, cleaning up your email list is is beneficial and worth the hard work. With a smaller, higher quality list you will likely see increased open and click through rates and stay far away from the dreaded blacklist. Let’s look at the 5 most common signs it’s time to clean up your lists.
You Have Mistakes in Spelling and Punctuation
We’ll ease you into this clean up thing and start off with an easy one: checking the spelling and punctuation of your emails. If you are noticing a lot of bounced emails or undeliverable addresses, it may be that they are in your contact list incorrectly. Look through and correct any you notice regularly to decrease your bounce rate.
Contacts Haven’t Opened Your Emails for Over 6 Months
In our Dashboard, you can easily see who opens each Campaign email and in each contact listed, it shows their engagement with the emails sent out through our platform.
This is a screenshot of one of our Campaigns going out to an advisor’s contact. As you can see, this person hasn’t opened or clicked through an email since before April 5th, 2016. If you were this advisor, it might be time to reach out to this contact to see if they’re still interested.
This isn’t to say, though, that if a client hasn’t opened your emails for 6 months that they are a lost cause. You could create a drip campaign to see if they are still interested, you could send out something new to see if they engage with new content, or you could send a personal email asking if they would still like to be subscribed to your emails. Here is an example you can use:
Hello [NAME]
We hope you and your family have been well. We’ve noticed that you haven’t opened the last few of our emails and wanted to make sure you are still interested in the information we send out. We would hate to clutter your inbox unnecessarily!
Let us know if you like to stay subscribed to our emails or only receive select emails. We greatly appreciate your business and hope we can continue to be in contact!
Sincerely,
[YOUR FIRM’S NAME]
Your Open Rates Are Below Average
According to Smart Insights, the average open rate for the finance, banking, and insurance industries is about 8%. This shouldn’t be viewed as an absolute number because it takes into account promotional materials from large institutions, but it is something to go off of. If your open rate is much lower than this, it means that your emails aren’t getting traction or you aren’t reaching the right crowd.
When studying our clients’ emails, we have found that a lot of them are toting 20% or higher open rates. By cleaning up your list, you can have numbers this impressive, as well.
You Are Getting Complaints
One of the worst (and most obvious) ways to know that your email lists are inaccurate is when you start to get complaints from subscribers that you send too many emails or that they aren’t relevant. If you are receiving complaints when you send emails, see what you can do to remedy the situation ASAP. These complaints can tarnish your brand, decrease your credibility, and can lead to a drop in referrals or business.
You See an Increase in Spam Rates
Because many of our advisors have a smaller number of contacts and send out less emails, this warning sign may be less common but it’s something to consider nonetheless. Bounce and Spam Rates are analytics that email providers and search engines take into consideration when ranking a business. If your spam reports continue to rise, it may be detrimental to your online brand and could get you into serious trouble with your email provider. Monitor your spam reports regularly to assure that you stay on the Internet’s good side!
Often times, having hundreds of email subscribers can help a business owner’s ego, but doesn’t necessarily lend to increased business. Regularly update your list to make sure you are attracting the right kinds of clients and not over mailing or mailing to the wrong people.
