Make This the Year You Stop Screwing Up Email
by Jay Baer
Hey guys, welcome back to Jay Today! I want you to make 2017 — this year — the year that you stop screwing up email!
My friend Tim Hayden posted just recently today that the word of the day is “unsubscribe,” and he couldn’t be more correct.
Look, this is not a new phenomenon. It’s is the beginning of the year which means it’s time to clean out your closets — both actual closets and metaphorical, digital closets. So you’re going to your inbox and are getting rid of unwanted email subscriptions. Lots of people do that today or over the last few days. It happens all the time. But yet, even now in 2017, so many companies, including possibly yours, are so wrong with how they handle email, especially unsubscribes.
Ironically, Jay Today is brought to you by our friends at Emma email marketing — get more from your email marketing at myemma.com to help you fix some of these problems as it turns out.
So here’s the thing that just happened to me today, which is why this is today’s episode of Jay Today. I went to unsubscribe to an email and I clicked unsubscribe and it took me to an online form where I had to answer whole bunch of other questions: what’s your email address… like you don’t know that? You want this other email, this other email over here? Maybe you’d like to do that? All these checkboxes and what’s your blood type? Look, I just want to stop getting email from you! Why are you making me go through all these hoops? You are taking a bad situation and you are making it way worse.
You want one-click unsubscribe. So many clicks to unsubscribe to get stopped sending an email? It’s not that hard. Email has been around for 25 years, almost 25 years commercially. In fact, I worked for the company that sent the very first ever email marketing notice back in the early nineties so I’ve been doing this for a long time. It’s not that hard now.
The one thing we do at Convince & Convert that we tested extensively last year that works really, really well, is if you want to unsubscribe to our email, we’ll take you off the list but we will send you an opportunity to get back on the list. We say look, did you know that you could get our email less often? And by the way, if you unsubscribe we’re gonna do terrible things to my puppy, Marigold!
We’ve actually had a much larger win-back rate of people who say, “look don’t do anything to this puppy,” and stay on the list. So I think that’s fair game; like give people a chance to say, “well, maybe I don’t want it every day, but maybe I still want it sometimes.” I think that’s fine, but taking someone to a really complicated form when all they want to do is stop getting email is absolutely the wrong way to go.
And while we’re at it, why are we sending so many emails, especially for things that you know your customers do not need all the time? I bought some underwear recently from Duluth Trading Company. Have you seen their TV commercials? They are kind of funny — illustrated black-and-white and featuring bears typically, so I bought some underwear from them, and I’ve got to tell you it’s great; probably the best underwear I’ve ever had, so props to, Duluth Trading!
But once I bought underwear from them (on their website, of course, because that’s how I roll), I got an email from them EVERY SINGLE DAY. Every day!
Nobody needs daily email, guys! Get back to me in a couple years after I’ve gone through this. You’re like, “I know that they have other products. I get that, but just because I bought some underwear doesn’t mean I also want a jacket, and socks, and a hat, and a backpack.” I mean, you’re making assumptions about my buying behavior that simply are not true and are not present.
So just because somebody buys one thing and says “Yeah, keep me updated on specials” does not mean they want email every single day!
And look, I know it’s harder than ever to reach your audiences. Social media has gotten way, way more difficult. Content marketing is more competitive than ever. I get it. I do it everyday. But email is too important to the future of your business and the future my business to keep screwing it up!
We have to be more careful about how we handle people’s relationships with our businesses in email. I implore you: make this the year that you stop screwing up email. Less is very much more.
Less is very much more.
Today’s question — please enter it in the comments below:
“What is the most useful…the most useful marketing or business email that you currently receive? I can’t wait to see what you all say about that.
Reminder: don’t miss a single episode of Jay Today. Just go to JayToday.TV to get all of them and you’ll probably catch me live. If not, that’s how you can do it, and I will see you next time. Now answer the question, and share this with your friends, please!
Originally published at www.convinceandconvert.com.
