How does sending emails to old inactive profiles impact deliverability and what preventative steps can be taken?
Summary
What email marketers say13Marketer opinions
Marketer from Email Geeks suggests notifying your service provider about the incident so they can prepare to support you or address any delayed backlash.
Email marketer from HubSpot emphasizes the negative impact of inactive contacts on email deliverability. They note that sending to unengaged contacts leads to lower engagement rates, increasing the likelihood of emails being marked as spam. It recommends re-engaging or removing unengaged contacts.
Email marketer from Optinmonster suggests using double opt-in to avoid spam traps. With double opt-in users have to confirm they want to be on your list. That way you know they weren't added without their permission and helps minimize the risk of hitting spam traps and maintain a clean email list.
Email marketer from ActiveCampaign recommends using segmentation to identify and target different groups of subscribers based on their engagement levels. This allows you to send more relevant content to engaged subscribers and tailor re-engagement campaigns for inactive contacts. Clean out bounced emails.
Email marketer from Reddit explains that sending to old lists increases the risk of spam traps and hard bounces. User suggests using email verification services to identify and remove invalid or risky email addresses before sending.
Email marketer from Gmass recommends warming up a new IP address or domain slowly, especially when starting cold email campaigns. This involves gradually increasing send volume to establish a positive sending reputation with ISPs and avoid being flagged as spam.
Marketer from Email Geeks shares additional options to mark old inactive profiles as non-sendable and get a baseline estimate of expected send size for comparison before deployment.
Email marketer from Campaign Monitor advocates for using re-engagement campaigns to revive inactive subscribers. They suggest creating targeted emails with compelling offers or content to encourage subscribers to re-engage. If subscribers don't respond, it's best to remove them from your list.
Email marketer from Neil Patel Blog explains that sending to inactive subscribers negatively impacts deliverability by increasing bounce rates and spam complaints, signaling to ISPs that your list is unengaged. He advises removing inactive subscribers regularly.
Email marketer from Moosend explains that maintaining good email list hygiene is crucial for deliverability. They recommend regularly removing invalid or inactive email addresses, as well as those who have unsubscribed or marked your emails as spam. This helps improve engagement rates and sender reputation.
Email marketer from Litmus explains that low engagement rates negatively affect deliverability by signaling to mailbox providers that your emails are not valuable to subscribers. They recommend focusing on sending relevant content to engaged subscribers and removing or re-engaging inactive contacts. Also use preference centres.
Email marketer from ZeroBounce recommends using email verification services to identify and remove invalid, risky, or inactive email addresses from your list. This helps reduce bounce rates, improve engagement, and protect your sender reputation.
Email marketer from Email on Acid recommends regularly cleaning your email list to remove inactive subscribers and improve engagement. They suggest using segmentation to identify unengaged contacts and implement a re-engagement campaign before removing them from your list. Also use double opt-in.
What the experts say5Expert opinions
Expert from Word to the Wise advises regular list hygiene as a preventative measure to maintain deliverability. Removing inactive subscribers helps maintain a healthy sending reputation and reduces the risk of being flagged as spam.
Expert from Email Geeks suggests performing a non-blamey incident analysis to identify and fix process and tooling issues to prevent future similar mistakes.
Expert from Spam Resource explains that your sender reputation greatly impacts your deliverability and suggests that good sender habits are to remove bad addresses.
Expert from Email Geeks explains that a one-time mistake of sending to old profiles is recoverable if the overall reputation is good. She suggests expecting temporary rate limiting and failures, suppressing complaints and bounced addresses. If problems persist, restrict sending to engaged addresses.
Expert from Spam Resource explains that spam traps are email addresses that are used to identify spammers. Sending to these addresses hurts deliverability.
What the documentation says4Technical articles
Documentation from SendGrid explains that warming up your IP and domain increases trust so you do not get marked as spam. Suggests starting with low volume and slowly increasing send volume over time to build a positive sending reputation. In addition, ensure good email practices such as authenticating emails (SPF, DKIM, DMARC) and providing clear unsubscribe options.
Documentation from Microsoft emphasizes the importance of building a good sender reputation to avoid spam filters. They suggest using email authentication (SPF, DKIM, DMARC), avoiding spam trigger words, and providing clear unsubscribe options to maintain a positive sending reputation.
Documentation from Google Postmaster Tools explains that monitoring your sender reputation helps identify deliverability issues. This tool provides insights into spam rates, IP reputation, and domain reputation, allowing you to address problems before they significantly impact deliverability.
Documentation from Mailchimp explains that regularly cleaning your audience helps maintain a healthy list and improve campaign performance. They recommends using segmentation to identify and target inactive subscribers and then remove or re-engage them.