What are the best strategies for email list validation and hygiene?
Summary
What email marketers say10Marketer opinions
Email marketer from HubSpot suggests using a reputable email validation service to identify and remove potentially harmful email addresses like spam traps before sending campaigns, improving deliverability.
Email marketer from Reddit recommends segmenting your list and sending re-engagement campaigns to inactive subscribers before removing them. This provides one last chance for them to re-subscribe or be removed gracefully.
Email marketer from OptinMonster advocates for using lead magnets to attract high-quality subscribers who are genuinely interested in your content, which leads to a more engaged and responsive email list.
Email marketer from Litmus highlights the importance of using mobile-responsive email designs to improve engagement, as more subscribers are opening emails on mobile devices. This also enhances overall list hygiene by encouraging more opens and clicks.
Email marketer from Email Marketing Forum suggests maintaining a suppression list to exclude recipients who have unsubscribed or marked your emails as spam, preventing accidental emails to those individuals and protecting your sender reputation.
Email marketer from Constant Contact says segmentation is an effective way to ensure your subscribers only receive information that is most interesting to them. This results in higher open rates, lower opt-out rates and better ROI.
Email marketer from ZeroBounce explains that automated email list cleaning tools help you stay on top of maintaining your list. These tools can identify and remove invalid, toxic, and risky email addresses that could cause damage to your deliverability.
Email marketer from Neil Patel recommends regularly cleaning your email list to remove inactive subscribers and reduce bounce rates, as it improves sender reputation and deliverability. This includes removing subscribers who haven't opened emails in a while.
Email marketer from Email on Acid suggests performing regular list audits to identify and correct any data errors, such as typos or outdated information, to maintain a clean and accurate email list.
Email marketer from Reddit advises immediately removing email addresses that result in hard bounces from your list to prevent future deliverability issues and maintain a healthy sender reputation.
What the experts say7Expert opinions
Expert from Email Geeks asks what sort of “bad addresses” the user is seeing / concerned about, listing examples such as non-existent addresses, addresses not belonging to the user, reports as spam, and non-responsive addresses.
Expert from Word to the Wise advocates for establishing a 'sunset policy' where subscribers who haven't engaged in a specific timeframe (e.g., six months or a year) are either re-engaged or removed from the list to improve engagement rates.
Expert from Email Geeks advises dropping recipients off lists FAST if they don't open or click in 12-14 days.
Expert from Spam Resource stresses the importance of utilizing complaint feedback loops to identify subscribers who are marking emails as spam. Removing these subscribers promptly improves sender reputation and overall list hygiene.
Expert from Email Geeks states that anything done after the fact to "clean" the data just cleans off the crap that was going to fall off in the first send anyway.
Expert from Word to the Wise recommends implementing CAPTCHAs or similar verification methods on signup forms to prevent list bombing attacks, where malicious actors flood a list with fake subscriptions.
Expert from Email Geeks shares an article about using data hygiene tools at the point of collection to encourage recipients to correct their addresses.
What the documentation says4Technical articles
Documentation from Validity explains that participating in feedback loops with ISPs allows you to identify and remove subscribers who are marking your emails as spam, preventing future deliverability issues.
Documentation from Kickbox explains that real-time email verification at the point of signup can prevent invalid or disposable email addresses from ever entering your list, improving data quality from the start.
Documentation from Mailchimp emphasizes the importance of using double opt-in to ensure subscribers genuinely want to receive emails. This helps build a high-quality list and reduces the chances of spam complaints.
Documentation from SendGrid explains that list validation improves deliverability, protects sender reputation, reduces bounce rates, and enhances engagement by ensuring emails are sent to valid and active email addresses.