A Little Reminder

People are forgetful. They walk out of the house and forget their keys. Sometimes they miss important meetings. They also sometimes forget that they subscribed for your mailings. Just like every other facet of life, it is important to have reminders. This can be done simply by placing wording in your emails to remind your subscribers that they signed up for your list. Permission reminders help establish trust in your brand.

ClickZ posted a great article about how to write permission reminders the right way. A vague message can actually do more harm than good for your brand image, and as he says it is important to explicitly let them know how and where they opted in to your list. If subscribers can’t tell from the reminder that you care for their privacy, they are far more likely to report messages as spam and hurt your deliverability.

He also provides a list of 5 simple steps to keep trust in your unsubscribe process:

1) Use an unsubscribe procedure that takes as few steps as possible. The more difficult that it is to unsubscribe from mailings, the more likely it is that they will be reported as spam. If it is difficult to unsubscribe, the reader will be less likely to resubscribe in the future, and worse they will let their colleagues know about their difficulties keeping them from subscribing as well. Read more about the brand damaging effects of difficult unsubscribe practices here.

2) Tell users exactly where you got their names. If there are multiple sources, a simple database flag will allow you to populate this for each reader.

3) Place the statement where readers can easily see it. The key to this one is to be consistent. While it is a good idea to place this at the top of the email, so that the person reading it knows right away why they got it and don’t have to read the entire message, consistently placing the information in an email admin center can work as well.

4) Test your unsubscribe procedure regularly, either by clicking the links or sending test e-mail. This one is critical for a variety of reasons, legal compliance, brand trust, and spam complaints are just a few. There are even companies that you can contract to monitor your compliance and unsubscribe functionality like Lashback.

5) Provide alternate methods for removal, such as a telephone number or dedicated postal address subscribers can use if they can't or choose not to use the online version.

I would add to this list to be consistent with your from addresses and names. If you are doing a list rental for another company, and present to your list that the email is “from” that other company, the likelihood of them complaining without even opening your emails is considerably higher. It would be better to present the email as from you on behalf of the company renting your list. You can even present it as a recommendation or exclusive offer based on the fact that they are in your elite list. Read this to find out more about list rental.