This is a guest post by Scott of Income Superhero
Picture this.
You’ve crafted an amazing email broadcast to your list. You’ve packed it full of value. You can’t wait for everyone to open it, read it and fall even more in love with you.
A day after you hit send, you log into your autoresponder account to take a look at the stats.
As you get into the report your eyes immediately focus in on the number of unsubscribers. Your heart drops. You see that 25 people have unsubscribed.
Did I offend people with that email? Did I bother people? Do they hate me?
No. No. And NO!
Don’t stress over unsubscribers.
You should be happy that those people decided to remove themselves from your list.
Here’s why.
Your List Gets Leaner and More Focused
There are three main factors that determine whether or not a subscriber is going to buy something from you. They have to know, like, and trust you. Without these three things it’s difficult to convert someone from a lurker to a buyer. That’s just the way it is.
Your subscribers get to know you by seeing your emails in their inbox and actually opening them. Staying in touch on a regular basis helps you stay top of mind.
To get them to like you, you have make sure your personality shines through in those emails. You just need to be yourself and people will decide whether or not you’re a good fit. It’s not possible for everyone to like you (as much as you’d like that).
If you’re consistently offering them value in your emails you’re building trust. People will put their guards down once they realize that you’re actually there to help.
The people that stay on your list and are opening and reading your emails are the people you want to focus on. They’re the ones who are most likely to actually buy something that you recommend to them. Some call them the members of your “tribe”. You should treat them like gold.
So, why do people unsubscribe? Why don’t they just stay on your list until the end of time?
Well, people unsubscribe for many reasons. Some of those reason have nothing to do with you (no longer interested in the topic, inbox cleanup, just wanted a freebie you offered and take off once they get it). Some of those reasons are, in fact, related to you (they don’t jive with you, they feel you email too often). Don’t let this get you down, though.
If you think carefully about the people who leave, you’ll realize that they probably weren’t going to ever buy anything from you. If they did, it was going to take A LOT of work.
Having people voluntarily unsubscribe means your open/click rates will be higher because the remaining people are more focused. It’s a way to keep your list pruned. Remember, the people who stay are interested (they don’t stay on your list for the sake of it). The ones who leave are not.
Focus on the people who know, like and trust you. Don’t waste energy on trying to convert the ones who don’t. That’s a hamster wheel you’ll never get off.
You Save Money
Most email service providers charge you based on the number of people on your list. Generally, there are tiers. As your list grows, so does that monthly payment.
In essence, you’re paying a small fee per subscriber.
So, why would you want to pay for someone to be on your list who doesn’t want to be there or just isn’t interested in what you’re offering? I sure wouldn’t.
If you’re paying for each subscriber, you want them to be a quality subscriber. You want them to be someone who, in the future, may actually buy something from you.
As your list get bigger you should be cleaning it up manually at least once per year anyways. This means removing people that aren’t opening or clicking any of your emails. The goal here is to keep only the best prospects on your list. By doing this, your open rates and click rates also improve.
When people unsubscribe they are doing the cleanup for you. You should actually thank them!
If they aren’t interested in what you’re offering but remain on your list, there’s a good chance they’re not going to open your emails anyways. Let them self-identify as a poor lead and move on. So long, my friend!
Saves You Time And Energy
When people decide to unsubscribe from your list it actually saves you time and energy.
This circles back to the point about focusing your energy on people who truly care about you and your message. We’ll call these people “golden nuggets”. You want to do everything you can to keep the golden nuggets happy.
On the other hand, there are people who just suck up all your energy who will just never buy anything from you. We’ll call these ones “black holes”. They suck up all your time and energy by:
- Complaining about emails you send
- Looking for nothing but free advice from you
- Asking favors from you with no value in return
All of these types of things take a certain amount of energy even if you decide not to respond. You still have to take the action of reading what they have to say, which isn’t a great use of your time.
This is sort of like the 80/20 rule. 80% of your revenue will come from 20% of your customers.
A portion of the people outside of that 20% are going to be black holes. If they choose to unsubscribe….all the power to them.
This helps you identify your best subscribers and let’s you focus more of your energy on them.
Smile When You See Unsubscribers
Don’t get hung up or stressed out when you see people leaving your list. This is the wrong mentality.
Unsubscribe doesn’t have to be the dirty word people make it out to be.
Embrace it. Let people choose to say “goodbye” and move on. It’s a win-win. They can go and find someone/something that may be a better fit for them and you can focus more on the people that truly care about you and your message.
One Final Word Of Caution
You now know that getting unsubscribes isn’t a bad thing. Having a healthy amount is actually good for your list.
That doesn’t mean you should completely ignore this number in your reports. You should still keep an eye on it to make sure it doesn’t get TOO high.
An unsubscribe rate of under 2% is fine. If it starts to creep above that number you may want to have a look at what you’re doing and make some changes. This could be related to frequency or the actual email content.
Next time you see unsubscribers in your reports, tip your virtual hat to them and thank them for the time, energy and money they saved you.
This post is SO good. I used to get so upset over unsubscribers but now I am happy to see them go. I like to think of it kind of like the konmari method, Thank you for giving me joy when you joined my email list and let it go.
Konmari is the perfect way of describing it!
This post is spot on. I don’t focus on the unsubscribers anymore because that means that they weren’t part of my ideal audience.
Exactly!