There was a time so-called industry experts doubted the effectiveness of email marketing in its ability to reach and engage potential leads. However, when we see emerging businesses succeeding on the basis of their email marketing campaigns, the effectiveness of this medium can’t be denied.

To put it simply, email marketing is here to stay.

52% of people check their email 2 to 6 times a day, which presents an incredible opportunity for marketers to get their message across to their target market.

Now for the bad news.

A 2021 survey showed that more than 4 in 10 respondents opt out of receiving brand emails.

A crucial mistake most marketers make is taking that as a sign to abandon their email marketing campaign altogether.

They fail to realize that they just need to delve deeper and discover why people are unsubscribing from emails and then adopt strategies to remedy that.

When done right, there is nothing like the power of email marketing. Businesses using this marketing medium can expect it to:

  • Save on marketing budgets as it’s cost-effective
  • Target warm traffic, i.e., online users who are interested in the brand but haven’t made a purchase
  • And guarantee visibility for their brands, products, offers, etc.

Why Are My Customers Unsubscribing From Emails?

While most businesses are too busy getting customers to subscribe to email lists and newsletters, they are unwilling to invest even half the time to retain those customers.

This attitude creates a problem requiring immediate attention.

Here, we have shortlisted the top reasons subscribers might opt out of your emails with quick fixes to prevent anyone from hitting that ‘email unsubscribe’ button again!

1. Customers Had No Idea They Were Subscribing

You wouldn’t like being hounded by random people, would you?

Such is the sentiment people experience when receiving emails they are not interested in. 23% of customers receive marketing emails from brands they never subscribed to.

If you thought auto-subscribe or other discreet ways to get people to subscribe to your newsletter work, think again. The moment a user realizes they didn’t subscribe to your brand emails or have no memory of it, they will unsubscribe. So, tactics like renting or scraping to add customers to your email lists are useless.

Such unsolicited emails will not lead to the results you desire because, sooner or later, customers will opt out. We can safely say that you will be annoyed upon seeing messages from random businesses flooding your email inbox. So, know that recipients of your emails will also feel the same if you don’t get them on board the ethical way.

The probability of a customer coming across your email by chance and taking an interest is awfully low. So, we advise you not to tarnish your brand’s name with these fruitless tactics.

Quick Fix

Capture emails to grow subscriber lists

We have two words for you: permission marketing!

Consent is key, and it goes beyond interpersonal relationships. It’s high time businesses get on board with respecting users’ time and boundaries. Instead of increasing your email list with sneaky tactics, ask customers to opt in willingly.

Think of it this way. If your email recipients didn’t sign up to receive emails from you, that’s the opposite of warm traffic, i.e., you will waste your efforts on disinterested users. It might even cause these users to actively avoid your brand.

Build an organic email list with double opt-ins, where the user further confirms subscribing to your marketing emails after submitting their address at sign-up. Double opt-ins can seem slow, but their implementation will definitely build a relevant and responsive database. Slow and steady wins the race, and the success you’ll see with double opt-in will be proof of it.

2. You Send Way Too Many Emails

Too many emails leads to people unsubscribing from emails

The idiom “too much of a good thing” best describes the issue at hand here.

Sending too many emails to your customers will be overkill. Your aggressive tactic may force them to unsubscribe from your mailing list, causing you to lose leads and the money you spent to gain them. A 2016 survey showed that 19% of consumers used the ‘unsubscribe’ button as they received too many emails from a specific company.

The current fast-paced lifestyle allows people to barely have any free time, and finding availability is becoming increasingly hard with time. So, we can safely surmise that, in 2023, customers have even less time and patience than before to read every email you send their way. Mind you, the average employee receives over 120 emails per day.

While blog posts can be seen as fleeting pieces of content that don’t live long on people’s social feeds and search pages, they need to be produced more frequently. In contrast, emails remain in a user’s inbox until the user deletes them. You don’t need to send ten emails to refresh a user’s memory.

If anything, this over-enthusiasm might prove counterproductive. Sending too many emails may make your business look desperate and land you in your potential customers' spam folders or cause them to unsubscribe!

Quick Fix

You might have seen many blog posts and articles proposing the ideal email-sending frequency. The truth is a one-size-fits-all approach does not apply here.

Generally, a brand should communicate with its audience via email every 2 to 4 weeks to generate more leads.

A more viable strategy is scheduling your emails based on your target audience’s preferences. You should set your marketing email frequency based on how often your target audience uses its email and the relevance and value of your content. Not having a strategy in this regard will result in your marketing emails being sent to the spam folder, resulting in a waste of time, effort, and money.

If you’re sending repetitive or redundant content way too often, you’re at a high risk of customers unsubscribing from spam emails.

Keep user preferences at the forefront by allowing them to pick and choose how frequently they want to receive emails. You can give them the option of receiving emails on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis. Providing subscribers this flexibility will help prevent unpleasant opt-outs from your email list.

3. Your Email Looks Like Spam

A whopping 85% of all emails are spam.

Given this staggering number, email service providers and online security tools remain on high alert. The protection they provide directs any suspicious emails to the spam folder. Although done in the interest of users, this protection prevents online marketers like you from reaching your target recipient’s inbox. The hassle of browsing the spam folder to find your legitimate marketing email can bring about user fatigue, causing your subscribers to reach for the unsubscribe link.

If you follow unethical practices, a user might also list you as spam to protect themselves and maintain their privacy. Before discussing solutions that ensure users don’t unsubscribe, let’s look at the major reasons why your emails might be looking like spam:

  • Your email’s content contains spam triggers, i.e., phrases that are frequently used in spam messages
  • Your email design does not follow best practices
  • Your email contains too many attachments
  • Your email violates spam laws
  • Your email doesn’t use appropriate HTML practices

Quick Fix

If you want your email marketing efforts to be successful, make sure they steer clear of the audience’s spam folder.

For starters, avoid spam triggers like the plague!

Examples of spam trigger keywords include:

  • Text in all caps
  • Multiple exclamation marks or multiple dollar signs
  • Content words associated with adult content
  • Extreme phrases like ‘absolutely free’ and ‘easy money’ may be perceived as ways to bait the recipient into clicking on links
  • Unnecessary spaces or punctuation

Don’t use misleading or false subject lines like ‘RE’ unless you’re actually replying to an email. Instead of using over-the-top, exaggerated claims as clickbait, stay as close and true to the email content as possible.

Failure to show care in this regard and carrying on with unethical practices is a violation of electronic mail laws.

Grammatical errors and spelling mistakes not only put off a recipient but also make your email look like spam. Use professional proofreading services if you have to so as not to alert any spam filters.

Send Spam-Free Emails

Tired of consumers unsubscribing from spam emails that aren’t actually spam? Hire professional email writing services that avoid spam triggers and follow the proper HTML and email design protocols. These expert writers will ensure your emails reach your target market without recipients hitting the email unsubscribe button.

4. You Send Repetitive Content

Value addition should be every business’s mantra this year.

Most people get too focused on how much they are doing as opposed to what they are doing. The same formula applies to email marketing.

Research shows that the global attention span has dropped drastically owing to the wealth of information accessible. In light of this development, there is an increased pressure on businesses to focus on unique and engaging content, whether it's blog posts, articles, or the subject of our current discussion, emails.

To remain fresh in the consumer's mind, some marketers slightly tweak the content or refurbish old subject lines and press send. However, such efforts bear mixed to no results.

Revising old content to look new does more damage than good as most users can catch this tactic and view the email sender as not worthy of their time or attention. They will simply unsubscribe from your mailing list. Today’s audiences are discerning, choosing to only engage with brands that offer something of value to them and keep them interested.

Quick Fix

If you don’t have the time to produce new and unique emails, hire email professionals for the task. Resorting to recycled content will result in customers writing you off as a desperate brand whose emails they shouldn’t open.

Think of every email as a building block of your email marketing strategy. The most important thing is to realize that every piece you send is a direct reflection of your brand, so ensure that the association evokes a positive sentiment from the consumer.

Keep the email concise, engaging, and colorful to engage the reader. Spend time coming up with a compelling yet realistic subject line that forces the reader to take a look. If you’re worried people might be close to unsubscribing, offer temporary incentives like a discount on their first purchase until you’re back on the track with producing high-quality content.

If you don’t have anything important or new to tell your subscribers, why are you sending them emails? People already receive a lot of emails, and if yours isn’t adding any value to their life, they will unsubscribe.

Focus more on quality than quantity to get the desired result.

5. You Oversell In Your Email

 unsubscribing from emails

The agenda is to engage in email ‘marketing.’

However, that is no reason to overload your subscribers’ inboxes with marketing messages about your products and services! Online audiences are smart and discerning. They don’t settle for pushy and overly salesy ads, so there is no way they will be happy receiving emails that are hell-bent on getting a sale out of them.

Brands must realize that emails are a way to remain connected to the audience, not to make a sale. If you flood your subscribers with promotional content, they might start to feel they are being used. As a result, you might see some of them unsubscribing from emails, deciding not to engage with any of your marketing messages.

Quick Fix

Your email marketing strategy should be a wholesome blend of everything. Include the latest company news with some fun industry facts unrelated to the company. Wish the customer on special occasions and then add in that occasional sales email to garner conversions.

If you take the marketing part of the equation too literally, you will fail to build a rapport with the audience, which is the foremost concern for today’s consumer.

6. Your Email Does Not Fit the Reader’s Preference

Most marketers may follow all the strategies above, yet still receive opt-outs. There could be two reasons behind this.

A few opt-outs here and there are okay. You need to accept the fact that no matter how great your content is, it’s not going to be everyone’s cup of tea, especially when they are not your target market. You can’t blame a 17-year-old for not subscribing to an email list to receive messages about retirement savings, can you?

One reason some people might opt out of your email list is that your marketing messages do not suit their preferences. If that’s the case, you must invest time in getting to know your target audience.

Quick Fix

Understand that not all the people who subscribed to your mailing list did so for the same reason. Segmenting subscribers based on their specific areas of interest and then sending targeted emails is going to get you a far better response.

Segmenting your subscribers can have a major impact on your email campaigns, even more than the content present in the emails. Monitor your audience on social media to identify their areas of interest, what time they are active online, and so on.

Modify the sales pitch to the reader’s developing interests. If you send a subscriber the same email you sent them three years ago, know that they will lose the incentive to subscribe to emails from you.

Stop Users From Unsubscribing From Emails

Email marketing is not just about getting new subscribers, but retaining existing ones. To curb the loss of subscribers, work with a professional email writing service.

Content Development Pros has a team of expert email ghost-writers equipped to write engaging emails following all the protocols that save you from being labeled as spam. Get a range of well-written, concise, and compelling emails that guarantee traffic and build long-lasting relations with your target market.