Email lists experience subscribers leaving over time as people fall off or disengage. Companies that rely on email to cultivate business activities must battle this ticking time bomb by identifying re-engagement strategies to welcome inactive subscribers and cold leads back onto their roster. Instead of allowing these contacts to remain forever categorized as lost, a re-engagement email campaign can entice them, jog memories of why they opted in or engaged in the first place, and get them to re-subscribe.
The key to success with a re-engagement email is understanding why the person stopped engaging in the first place. Were they bored? Were they inundated with too many emails? Did they forget who the brand was? No matter the answer, sending some form of a re-engagement email at a certain time to an inactive subscriber can foster personalized communication, reinvigorate interest, and help them become paying clients once more.
Understanding Why Subscribers Become Inactive
Yet before sending re-engagement emails, businesses should assess why people are disengaging. There can be many reasons for diminishing engagement, and addressing the concern about why people once were interested but no longer are is the first step to winning back the inactive. For example, some contacts may have signed up in the first place out of curiosity and realized, over time, there was not enough relevant content to justify further communications. Some people may have changed email addresses and abandoned old accounts; some may have signed up for too many mailing lists and now find themselves in a position where they need to trim the fat between what’s excess and what’s useful, and unfortunately, the business that isn’t responding will fall under the former.
Sometimes people disengage for more mundane reasons. For example, email fatigue can happen. If a business sends too many emails, even if they contain relevant content, people may ignore them or mark them as spam. If a business takes too long without communicating, a subscriber may forget about the brand and disinterest when an email finally arrives in the inbox. Email warmup helps mitigate this by gradually building trust with email service providers, improving deliverability and engagement before full-scale campaigns are launched. Finding that balance is critical.
Also, some subscribers unsubscribe due to the content you’re sending them. For example, if your emails are more transactional than informational or entertaining, overly promotional emails might make some never open them in the first place. If the content does not match the expectation of what you provide when they signed up for you, they will not be a subscriber anymore.
So, over time, companies can better service certain demographics of less engaged subscribers by assessing the findings and trends. For example, if the findings indicate a drop in opens and clicks after an overly aggressive sale, it shows that maybe the content is too sales-heavy and contradicting the intention. If it drops after sending four emails per week and it shows the need to dial it back for future efforts, this can stop further unsubscribing.
This indicates that, over time, founders can evaluate subscriber activity, acknowledge unsubscribing and opening patterns, and with disconnects and disinterest evaluate via a customer feedback loop. Thus, as long as the marketer understands why people are dropping off, they can send re-engagement emails uniquely tailored to the subscriber’s concern that made them want to unsubscribe in the first place.
Crafting a Compelling Subject Line to Recapture Attention
The subject line of a re-engagement email is the most important element. If it doesn’t capture attention from the get-go, it’s going to get deleted anyway (or at least unacknowledged and annoying in an inbox), adding to the disconnect even more. Subject lines should be eye-catching, personalized, and inherently curious. For instance, “We Miss You Here’s Something Special Just for You” or “Is This Goodbye? Let’s Stay Connected” makes people contemplate opening the email. Personalizations help, so using someone’s name or reference to their last purchase, etc., boosts click-through rates. Email subject lines should act as a reminder of why someone signed up for the newsletter in the first place.
Personalizing Content to Reignite Interest
A generic email blast isn’t going to get cold leads back or inactive subscribers reactivated. This is why personalization is important as part of re-engagement campaigns, as it allows less active and more focused content to be rendered. Instead of sending the same inactive email to anyone and everyone on an inactive list, for example, now email marketers are empowered with data to let them trigger an email to someone who might be more inclined to open an email for a specific product or service based on what they purchased before or didn’t purchase.
For instance, email marketers can utilize the information regarding purchase history, browsing history, past email activity, and opens to determine what could be more geared toward one subscriber versus another. If someone looked at a ton of sneakers but never purchased any, then an email directed to them with a ton of sneakers for sale with a low, generic coupon could spark their interest. An athletic company could offer sneakers based on their activity with no suggestions for other products or workouts that might confuse the issue.
SaaS companies can also personalize based on feature usage. If someone took a free trial and never moved around to see all the options, a nice email can inform them of all the features they’re not using and how additional sections can help their experience. For example, a project management company can email with advice about its automation features step-by-step or video tutorials to encourage people to return to the free trial and see what else is offered.
Segmentation is an excellent way to personalize, too, with triaging. Suppose a person who subscribes to a financial services company’s email list shows that they haven’t engaged with investment advice anytime soon; it should send them various articles relative to their risk profile; this shows them that it’s not all or nothing regarding investment insights. If a subscriber has a movie subscription and isn’t watching for a while, an email can send them new movies relative to their previously watched history, encouraging the subscriber to come back to the platform for more recommendations.
Besides content, personalization can come from tone and messaging. Addressing someone by name, reminding them when they last used the service or product, or featuring dynamic content blocks that change based upon what a company knows about the subscriber make for a more engaged email with greater intimacy. Even subject lines like “We Found Something You’ll Love! from John” have the potential to get opened out of curiosity.
Therefore, the more connected content sent to the subscriber goes, the better chance of having them re-engage. Companies who genuinely know what their subscribers did and when are more poised to send re-engagement opportunities that feel relevant and prompt enough to open. Personalization takes what’s otherwise a generic approach to gaining someone back and makes it efficient, effective, trustworthy, and meaningful enough to restore faith and value and, in the end, reacquire a previously dormant connection.
Offering an Incentive to Encourage Engagement
At times, all it takes to reengage is an offer. A discount, free trial, or additional content makes the subscription genuinely valuable one last time, as people feel like they have access to even more while subscribing. Often, people will not engage otherwise.
For example, a subscription box service might want to send a final email with a coupon to re-subscribe, 25% off if they do, while a software company might want to give an additional month free. This offer should be sincere, not patronizing, and not a dip in standards; instead, it’s a courtesy to acknowledge that the post-cancellation experience was a business blunder.
Creating a Sense of Urgency to Drive Immediate Action
An urgent re-engagement email that makes a subscriber feel as if they need to reply right away is better than one that gives them no reason to reply anytime soon. If an email can foster a sense of imminent urgency whether it be a time-sensitive offer or imminent change in status this gets the subscriber to engage sooner rather than later.
For example, a service provider that operates on a monthly subscription basis might send an email that reads, “Your 10% Discount Expires in 48 Hours!” An email subject line like this will prompt someone to want to reply sooner rather than later. A clothing subscription service might also state that if they don’t hear from you, your preferences will default to all genders and sizes, which will make people engage for fear of losing what they’ve previously set up.
Using Interactive Elements to Rekindle Engagement
You don’t always need a call to action to generate engagement. For example, an email sent with a survey or poll or an ask for users to update their preferences removes the onus from users who are inactive and allows for passive engagement. For brands, however, such an email is useful feedback and information about their audience.
For example, one brand might send an email titled, “What Do You Want to See More of?” with four multiple-choice responses embedded in the body of the email as a means for readers to adjust their marketing plans. Instead of sending a million links to get back on track for a subscription, the brand can also provide a “Tap to Stay Subscribed” action button, making it extremely effortless for users to engage and show interest without the burden of more time-sensitive links. This turns engagement into more of a conversation than a sale.
Sending a Final “Breakup” Email to Clean Up the List
If a brand has reached out to re-engage people a handful of times, an ultimate “break up” email is the last-ditch effort to reel a subscriber back in while simultaneously cleaning the list. Many of these emails to unsubscribe let the subscriber know they will no longer be hearing from the brand unless they indicate otherwise.
For instance, a proper break-up email subject line is “We’d Hate to See You Go… But We Understand,” with a large button housed in the body of the email to make sure the subscriber stays on the list. Other brands take a more jovial tone, with titles like “This Isn’t Goodbye… Or Is It?” Even if a subscriber never responds, not that they will even if they are redirected, it’s good for the brand’s email list cleanliness going forward, as it removes undeliverables and subsequently boosts deliverability rates.
Measuring Re-Engagement Success and Refining Future Campaigns
Not only does a re-engagement campaign tell your brand how to win back those subscribers it lost, but it also reveals what’s successful and what’s not. By analyzing open rates, click rates, and conversions related to re-engagement emails, you can refine your efforts the next time.
For example, if the emails sent with special offers generate a much higher response than the emails focused on content, then next time your brand needs a campaign, you’ll know to focus on the exclusives. If specific subject lines get people to open the email with more urgency, that’s valuable for future campaigns. By measuring the outcomes, your email marketing campaigns in the future are more successful, and fewer people choose to unsubscribe.
Conclusion
Re-engagement campaigns are an important aspect of email marketing for any company because they give an opportunity for brands to reconnect with previously inactive subscribers and those cold leads who may have only visited their page one time. By assessing why someone may no longer want to engage with a brand, using persuasive subject line techniques to grab their attention, making personalized appeals to acknowledge the unsubscribe intention yet pique their interest again with a giveaway, and utilizing dynamic content to create an intriguing callback, any company can execute a re-engagement campaign.
When done correctly, it allows a brand to maximize its email list potential, increase customer loyalty, and ensure the type of engagement that gets brands to the next level. Therefore, instead of considering inactive subscribers as forever gone, they could potentially return with the proper welcome back suggestion.