On average, databases count between 30 and 50% of the non-opening contacts*. Disinterest in your communications, your products, your services, your brand… There can be many reasons why sleepy or “inactive” contacts ignore your email campaigns.
Targeting this target group blindly continues affect the quality of your database.
On the one hand because contacts can complain by clicking “This is spam” and on the other hand because ISPs/MSPs can decide to deliver your message directly to a spam mailbox, damaging your reputation as a sender over time.
This is why the email reactivation campaign is useful.
She allows it Target unresponsive contacts (Contacts stop responding to sent email messages for a period of time) or lose interest.
It aims to revive the attraction of these “sleepers”. (by offering different content or updating the profile, reducing frequency, questioning it…) or invite them to unsubscribe.
FurthermoreOptimize your deliverabilityincrease yours KINGavoid costs for contacts that bring you nothing and improve yours KPIsbecause this inactive part reduces your open rate.
Communication Emails: How to Spot the Signs of Disinterest?
All too often overlooked, contact lifecycle management is essential good database hygiene.
An argument that is all the stronger to hear when we know that withhold a customer is 10x more profitable than to conquer a new one*.
So watch out for early warning signs:
- Integrate an automated feedback program into your customer journey : Automatic detection of short and medium term non-reactivity ensures that your contact’s email address is always valid. This makes it easier for you to encourage them to read your newsletter.
- plan for cross-channel loyalty programs : Don’t block all your channels. A contact who doesn’t open your newsletters might still be inclined to visit the store.
- Test different transmission times and/or frequencies (both up and down): If you’re having an inactivity problem, it may be because the pressure you’re putting on your contacts is too much.
- Check collection sources to identify anomalies or vulnerable populations: this monitoring allows you to refocus your strategy and thus revise the segmentation of your database, improve the deliverability of your campaigns, protect your reputation, etc.
- Regularly delete outdated contact information : The email addresses of the “sleeping” contacts you keep are not addressable indefinitely. Remember that the GDPR requires the personal data of individuals who have been inactive for 3 years to be deleted from their database.
Email Deliverability: How to Combat Contact Inactivity?
Before archiving their data, many senders want Limit the impact of this loss by reintegrating discarded addresses.
However, don’t undermine your efforts in your recurring email campaigns by redirecting this volume without precaution:
- Distinguish active contacts by those who have not responded to your messages for some time (e.g. 6 months). You can identify sleeping contacts based on the registration date and the last date an email was opened.
- Don’t equate unresponsive contacts with the “silent part” of your basenamely the contacts who read your messages but never activate the pictures on their mailbox and are therefore never considered as openers.
- Try to wake up your “sleeping” contacts with ita highly stimulating reintegration operation (of one or more messages). Those who are still unresponsive after this campaign may be excluded from your targeting or permanently deleted from your database, at the risk of affecting your deliverability. Namely that most webmails degrade the reputation of the sender among 15% of reactive users (ie openers)*.
- During your reactivation campaign Avoid maintaining a link at all costs Costs with those who turn away from your email messages. Instead, suggest that they keep in touch with you through other channels, such as texting or social media.
- Be extremely cautious about your reactivation process. It takes 90 to 120 days for webmail or filters that index a sender’s reputation to retrieve the history of a campaign targeted at non-responsive people. This means that bad practices can have a negative impact several months after shipment.
Reactivation Campaign: Knowing how to say goodbye
This is the most classic mistake when one wishes it restore contacts : persevere at all costs!
Keeping contacts in your database that have been inactive for a long time exposes you to several risks:
- Exceeding ISP/MSP limits for invalid addresses
- Recycling specific addresses in spam traps
- User complaints in case of sudden load after years
- Address reuse by new users
learning to let go. When you start cleaning out your database and find your volume of addressable contacts decreasing, it’s normal to feel frustrated.
But that’s just a reprieve. He is pointless (and expensive) to keep wooing contacts who are no longer interested for your communication. This affects your campaign performance and puts your sender reputation at risk.
The case of messaging provider Laposte, which launched a major operation to clean up its user accounts, sheds a revealing light: 35% of inactive addresses over the last 6 months corresponded to permanently abandoned mailboxes.
That number has increased to over 50% in the last 12 months…
* Dolist deliverability service; White House Office of Consumer Affairs
