In the early days of email marketing, marketers considered opt-outs - aka unsubscribes - as a key measurement of the success of their mailing. Today, while opt-outs remain a metric to watch, smart marketers concentrate on performance metrics such as identified opens, click-throughs, forward rates and conversions.

The opt-out metric has become a less reliable indicator for a number of reasons; most of which grew out of bad email marketing practices. Many consumers have come to believe that unsubscribing from something will indicate they are a live address and that they’ll receive even more unwanted emails. Also, many marketers make it difficult to opt-out easily – under the mistaken notion that forcing the subscriber to remain on the list will eventually lead to a sale.

The industry benchmark for opt-outs today for permission-based mailings ranges from .1% - 2%. This figure factors in all business sectors, B2B and B2C, types of mailings, as well as acquisition vs retention.

While remaining within this percentage range, MarketingSherpa’s Benchmark Guide 2008 reported a slight increase in opt-outs over the last year. This is good news because it is most likely an indicator that recipients may be beginning to trust the unsubscribe process and, more importantly, marketers are making the opt-out function more user-friendly.

Opting out is the not worst thing a subscriber can do
Marketers need to understand that offering an easy opt-out is not only best practice – it is part of building trust in a brand and with the company’s mailings. Creating barriers simply means your recipients mentally opt-out of your mailing in other ways, with negative equity building against your brand and reputation every time they receive your email. Many subscribers delete emails, even more designate them to the junk folder – and some take the extreme measure of abandoning their email address if they get overwhelmed with unwanted emails. 

Then there’s the dreaded “report as spam” button. JupiterResearch’s recently released report found that 26% of consumers unsubscribed using this method, and 80% did so without opening the actual message. Why is the “report as spam” button a problem? Too many of these reports can lead to an ISP blocking future emails from the sender.

Implement best practice for opt-in strategies
To develop a strategy for opt-outs, it is a good idea to start at the very beginning of the process: the opt-in. This is where your company can establish a good relationship with the recipient and set up the permissions to contact.

Review your data collection practices – Often opt-outs or reports of spam occur because you haven’t established the right permission with the recipient. Review your companywide marketing methods. Find out where and how addresses are being sourced in every department. Establish a companywide stringent permission policy. Have a co-ordinated mailing schedule for all departments so your company is not over mailing. ‘Too frequently’ is a top reason for complaints and the main reason you lose the attention of your subscriber.

Set and maintain customer expectations - Be crystal clear and transparent in all your sign up activities. Opt-in points should tell people exactly what they’re going to receive from a company, when they’re going to receive emails and how often. Have a prominent privacy policy link that tells people exactly what you’re going to do with their data. Send only what you say you are going to send – and when.

Identify Yourself - The outer envelope (the from/subject line) needs to provide Instant Recognition. Even if you have the correct permission, if they don’t immediately recognise you they’ll delete the email or report you as spam.

Implement a strategy for staying on top of the changing relationship with the recipient – Another reason for opt-outs is the sender’s lack of recognition of the relationship. Examples of this include companies who send emails to customers telling them about special offers available to non-customers only, or information about products and services a recipient has already bought from the company.

Control Opt-outs with a subscriber preference centre
Surveys have consistently found that the top reasons people switch off to permission-based emails are: they are not relevant, are no longer relevant or they come too frequently. 

Companies who give control to the recipient will find that they get better results from their mailings.
Creating a subscriber preference centre, or subscribe box, eliminates the frustration which leads to opt-outs. Most people unsubscribe because there’s no other choice – many would like to hear from a company, but want different content, or perhaps a different frequency. A preference centre in every issue gives subscribers the ability to create the types of emails they want receive from you.  Example preferences include: products or services, frequency, content (e.g. just events, or events and new products), region or demographic, and what type of contact they want (e.g. transactional only, all mailings, alerts only, etc.)

Opt-out exit strategies
It’s important to first understand what is required legally. In the UK the Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003 it states where a company is legally allowed to send their email marketing messages; those messages must include an easy and free-of-charge opt-out process. The directive does not note a time frame in which this must be implemented. A spokesman from the ICO said it would certainly be expected to happen within 21-28 days. However, best practice dictates a company should try to suppress an opt-out from future mailings ASAP – or run the risk of getting reported as spam, even though complying with legislation. There have been no legal cases to date relating to the opt-out process; there has been one legal case, a civil action in late 2005, where £270 damages were paid for spam emails sent to an individual.

Here are some ideas for optimising - the “opt-out” function to have it actually serve as an “opt-in” process to retain the subscribers by giving them the control of their subscription:

Define the opt-out – Define what type of opt-out the subscriber wants. Is this a global opt-out, is it an opt-out to the specific mailing? Make sure they have choices other than simply global opting out.

Offer a different communication channel - Though email is extremely popular, it may be that people would prefer to receive the information in a different channel. For example the individual may prefer to receive an RSS feed.

Implement a Change of Address Function – One reason people opt-out is to then sign up with another address. It would be a good idea to implement an easy function in your subscribe that allows people to change their email address.

If the subscriber goes through the entire opt-out process, find out why. Don’t require a response, but asking for feedback during the opt-out process can give you insight into the reasons you are losing subscribers. Rather than just a text box, give them a variety of reasons to select from such as "Content is no longer relevant", "I'm subscribing using a different method (such as RSS)", "I do not recall subscribing to this", "This comes too frequently" and "Other, or will not disclose".

Include opt-out metrics in trending
Include the opt-out metric in all your benchmarking reports. Trend them across issues to note blips, such as a huge increase. Use the data to match against frequency and permission changes, as well as other elements in your emails, to improve your relationship with your subscribers.

Denise Cox
Newsweaver
www.newsweaver.com