Read also the first part of the article, “Smart Tips on How to Get More Email Subscribers“.
How to Maintain Your Email Database?
Once you start building your mailing list, it’s imperative to take good care of it. First of all, always get permission to email. That is the most critical step in building a healthy mailing list.
Nurturing your database will help your email campaigns become even more successful and reduce bounces, unsubscribes, and, of course, abuse complaints (in other words, being marked as spam).
Manage Bounces
Paying attention to your bounces is crucial. Soft bounces can mean a temporary issue such as a full inbox; thus, after a few of them, suspend that contact email address in your mailing list. However, a hard bounce will most likely show you that the recipient’s email address or domain name does not exist. Thus, you should immediately remove hard bounces from your sending list.
Smaily and other great email marketing service providers take care of your bounces automatically for you.
Re-engage or Remove Inactive Subscribers
You should not email inactive subscribers – you don’t want to damage your email deliverability. Thus, if you have contacts that haven’t interacted with your emails for a while (6-12 months), remove them from your mailing list or try to re-engage them one more time. If they do not – just stop emailing them altogether. In this case, always go for quality over quantity.
Try to email your list at least once a month. Regular email deployments firstly will help your readers to remember your business and your brand. Also, it will help you maintain a healthy mailing list. This way, you will be on top of your most recent bounces and unengaged contacts.
Segment Your Mailing List
It’s best to maintain one master database, where you keep all of your contacts. Instead of creating multiple mailing lists, why not try and segment your main one? Narrow it down to specific segments, or filter your contacts into different, smaller, more targeted ones without removing them from your master database. Remember, the more targeted your emails are, the better results you will get.
Help your email marketing become a productive part of your overall marketing strategy.
Next: Ten Smart Ways To Segment Your Mailing List
We have written about the different methods of getting new email subscribers and looking after a mailing list. In the next blog post, we will show you ten smart ways to segment your mailing list – how to be more targeted and, in turn, achieve better results with your email marketing campaigns.
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