How should I re-engage a dormant email list with high spam complaints?
Summary
What email marketers say10Marketer opinions
Email marketer from Neil Patel Blog explains the importance of list hygiene. Regularly clean your list by removing inactive subscribers to improve deliverability and reduce spam complaints before trying to re-engage.
Email marketer from Reddit recommends gradually increasing the volume of emails sent when re-engaging a dormant list, especially if you've switched ESPs or IPs. This 'warming up' process helps establish a positive sender reputation.
Email marketer from Litmus recommends A/B testing different subject lines and content in your re-engagement campaign to see what resonates best with your audience and minimizes spam complaints.
Email marketer from ActiveCampaign Blog suggests sending a re-permission campaign. Ask subscribers if they still want to receive emails from you. This helps weed out unengaged users and improves your sender reputation.
Email marketer from EmailToolTester explains the risks involved in re-engaging a cold list, including damage to your sender reputation. They suggest proceeding cautiously and prioritizing list hygiene.
Email marketer from HubSpot advises setting frequency caps when re-engaging a dormant list. Don't bombard subscribers with emails; send a limited number of re-engagement attempts before removing them.
Marketer from Email Geeks responds regarding how long the list has been dormant, the nature of the product/service, immediate and longer goals with this group, the sales cycle, and definition of churn are all relevant to deciding on re-engagement strategy. Also the nature and timing of the last emails they received affects if re-engagment will work or not.
Email marketer from MailerLite Blog shares the approach of segmenting your dormant list based on past engagement. Target those who previously showed interest before contacting the entire list.
Email marketer from GMass suggests offering incentives, such as discounts or exclusive content, in your re-engagement emails to encourage subscribers to re-engage and opt-in again.
Marketer from Email Geeks suggests considering segmenting the list further and possibly deferring outreach to more casual users.
What the experts say4Expert opinions
Expert from Email Geeks explains that Mailgun might calculate spam complaint rates as a percentage of emails sent to a specific mailbox provider (e.g., Microsoft), while Customer.io might calculate it as a percentage of complaints per total send, which can skew the numbers.
Expert from Word to the Wise explains that segmenting a list before re-engaging is important - don't email non-responders. Also provides some guidance on how to segment and re-engage a list.
Expert from Email Geeks states that a 0.14% spam complaint rate is higher than expected from a permission-based list.
Expert from Word to the Wise responds that the definition of engagement is different depending on your business. If people click on links to content, that should be deemed as engagement. You should be very conservative on deeming emails unengaged.
What the documentation says4Technical articles
Documentation from RFC documentation explains how SPF records prevent sender address forgery, critical for improving deliverability. If your emails are not authenticated correctly, it will be hard to improve deliverability
Documentation from Google Postmaster Tools details the importance of following sender best practices, including authenticating your email (SPF, DKIM, DMARC) and maintaining a low spam complaint rate to ensure deliverability to Gmail users when re-engaging.
Documentation from Microsoft details sender guidelines for Outlook.com, including monitoring your sender reputation and taking steps to reduce spam complaints when re-engaging a dormant list to avoid being blocked.
Documentation from SparkPost explains that suppression lists of unsubscribed or bounced email addresses are critical for maintaining deliverability. Don't attempt to re-engage these addresses; remove them permanently.