How often do you undertake email list scrubbing? Not a trick question. If the answer is never, it’s time to crack on with this critical marketing task.

45% of global marketers agree that their biggest challenge in email marketing is maintaining an engaged list of recipients. Trying to market to a list of disengaged email subscribers is uninspiring and demotivating. If this resonates with you, scrubbing your email list will help get things moving in the right direction.

Let’s kick off with what email list scrubbing consists of, followed by helpful tips on decluttering your email marketing list and boosting your business’s ROI.

What Is Email List Scrubbing?        

The act of email scrubbing is removing unengaged subscribers from your business’s email list. Once this is done, you’re left with a list of subscribers that are engaged with your brand and are interested in hearing what your business has to offer them.

Benefits of Email List Scrubbing

• Better email open and click rates.
• Fewer email bounces.
• Reduces the cost of email campaigns.
• Establishes a good sender reputation.
• Improves conversion rates.
• Accurate campaign reporting.

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What to Do with Disengaged Subscribers

Before you go ahead and declutter your email list, consider your disengaged subscribers.

It may be that you have inactive subscribers that definitely must be removed, but you’ll also probably have subscribers that are just temporarily disengaged. If this is the case, well-timed and targeted emails could win them back on your business’s side.

To work out the disengaged from inactive subscribers, set your criteria. For example, if you’ve been sending campaigns covering coaching in a call center tips, but these emails remain unopened for three months or longer, you can choose to remove them.

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After identifying the disengaged users, segment them into a separate list to use for specific email marketing. Consider special discount codes, personalized subject lines, and other engagement methods to encourage engagement. It’s always worth giving disengaged users a chance to re-engage before removing them altogether.

If your re-engagement methods fail, you can mark them as inactive and clean up your email marketing list.

If you’re noticing a pattern of declining open and click rates in your email reports, it’s time to scrub. Here’s how to do it:

1. Identify spam email addresses: These email addresses are often an odd combination of letters and numbers. Get them gone.
2. Remove unsubscribers: You don’t want unsubscribers as part of your active email list.
3. Bought email lists: If your email list contains a historical list of email addresses you’ve bought, remove them from your list as they’re not exclusive or relevant to your business and don’t accurately represent your audience.
4. Duplicate emails: Use an Excel formula to remove duplicate email addresses from your active list.

Large email lists might need the help of a third-party service to scrub your email list for you, much like you’d choose platforms for ecommerce selling to maximize your online sales. Email scrubbing services validate your email addresses, fix typos, and block fake email addresses.

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Email List Scrubbing Best Practices

The number of global email users is set to grow to 4.6 billion users by 2025. With this significant statistic in mind, ensure that you follow the best practices to keep your email list in the best shape for maximum ROI.

1. Good hygiene schedule

Create a regular schedule for scrubbing your email list and stick to it.

2. Manage bounce rate

Check for bounced emails, as this method increases your email deliverability rates and email ROI. A soft bounce is a deliverability issue that can be fixed once servers are back up and running and these emails are sent eventually. A hard bounce is a permanent delivery issue and occurs in the event of an invalid email address. Consult with your VoIP call center providers for more advice on hard bounces.

It’s essential to manage your hard bounce rates as it impacts your email credibility with your ESP (Email Service Provider).

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3. Double opt-ins

Doubt opt-ins work to ensure that your subscribers want to be on your email list. This tactic avoids the scenario of lots of inactive users in your marketing campaigns. Consider email tracking tools to check the status of your email subscribers.

4. Email audience

Think about segmenting your email list into different audiences appropriate for your business’s message and campaigns. Seek ways to re-engage with disengaged subscribers by segmenting them into groups according to sign-up date, interests, and demographics. Multiple email lists will help you create targeted email campaigns that will convert because they are more targeted with relevant information.

5. Welcome emails

Engage new subscribers by automating welcome email campaigns. These emails attract your audience’s attention immediately and encourage them to find out what your business can offer. Use a conversational email tone, ask questions, and invite your new subscribers to reply to your emails by sharing valuable and relevant content. Why not learn how to make a digital brochure to share with your new audience?

Are You Ready to Scrub?

If you’re going to the trouble of sending regular marketing emails to your audience, it’s essential to take the time to conduct the task of email list scrubbing to maximize your ROI.

After all, with 88% of US businesses stating that email newsletters and communications are a valuable way to reach target consumers, your business should be amongst them.

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Email List Scrubbing FAQs

1. How often should you scrub your email list?

Shoot for around twice a year for a proper clean-up of your email list to detect fake emails and maintain your most relevant subscribers.

2. Should you delete inactive email subscribers?

Absolutely. Part of your email list scrubbing task is to remove users that aren’t engaging with your brand.

3. How do you optimize your email list?

Some best practices to optimize your business’s email list include:

• Finding inactive users and offering them the opportunity to unsubscribe.
• Removing spam email addresses.
• Identifying low-quality contacts.

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