Reactivation Nation

February 8, 2018

So, what do you do when you have a large amount of people who consistently don’t open your emails?

You’ve cleaned your list to get rid of invalid addresses, switched your messaging strategy to send people the most pertinent information, but you still have a group that isn’t engaging at all.

It’s time to run a reactivation campaign.

Let’s take a look at how to go about reactivating lapsed email subscribers:

1. Determine Your Criteria. Your criteria for what makes someone lapse might be different from the next organization depending on the nature of what you do. For example, if your organization has a once-yearly event, it might take someone 2 or 3 years to truly lapse. If you do events monthly throughout the year, it might be only 6 months before you can identify someone as lapsed. Take a look at your schedule and email sending habits and identify the criteria that you’ll use.

2. Isolate Lapsed Subscribers. There are a variety of ways to do this depending on your email software. If you’re using Constant Contact, you will likely need to identify them and move them into their own list. If you’re using MailChimp, you can create a custom segment of these folks for use in future campaigns. Whatever the method is, you want to be able to isolate your lapsed subscribers so that you can send emails to only them.

Pro Tip: If you are not sure how to accomplish this, reach out to the support team at your email software company. They will be able to help you set it up.

3. Send Them An Email. No, not one of your usual emails. Send them something specifically for the purpose of getting them to re-engage with you. Be honest about why you are sending it such as “You haven’t been opening our emails lately” and then give them an action to take like “Click here to change your subscription preferences.”

Here is an example for inspiration:

dog reactivate

4. Monitor The Results. After you send the email, be sure to monitor the results closely. Those who engage with the email are now no longer lapsed! If you have given people the option to choose what type of information they want to receive from you, segment it appropriately so that you are only sending them that type of content.

Ceci Dadisman is an arts marketer, nonprofit empowerer, and public speaker who loves helping organizations make marketing magic.

More from Ceci Dadisman on Fine-Tuning Your Email Strategy

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