How To Activate An Underused Email List

How To Activate An Underused Email List

Did you collect a bunch of email addresses but never mailed out much to them? Then it’s time to learn how you can activate an underused email list.

Sending more emails is one of the best ways to boost your revenue and create loyal customers. But maybe you didn’t use email marketing until now.

Or maybe you used to send out emails but stopped after a while and now you are unsure how to reengage and activate the underused influencer email list?

If that’s the case, keep reading because we will cover what you can do with an underused email list, how to warm it up again, and how to write a reactivation email.

Benefits of activating an underused email list

First, you might want to know, why should you even bother with this? The thing is, email is a powerful marketing tool but if you don’t use it, you won’t see any effects.

When your email list was underused until now, you won’t see a boost in revenue right away. You need to clean up your list first to make sure only active and engaged buyers are subscribed.

A reactivation or re-engagement campaign helps you to:

  • Improve your open rates and clickthrough rates
  • Boost email sales
  • Improve your email deliverability and authority
  • Keep list hygiene

What do you do with old email lists?

Reactivating an old email list has many benefits but keep in mind there are some risks. The issue is that email filters are getting smarter and there is the risk that you get flagged as a spammer.

Some people might have forgotten that they subscribed to your list at some point and they could get angry and flag your email. 

Plus, it could be that your domain authority is low and your email lands in Gmail’s promotions tab which further hurts your email deliverability.

While we do recommend reactivating your underused email list, keep these things in mind and reengage them slowly.

Send an email to reintroduce yourself first before you start pitching your products or services. 

How do I revive an old email list?

Activating an underused email list has many benefits. But how exactly do you revive an old email list? Here is how to do it step by step:

1. Analyze what happened

Why is your list underused in the first place? Did you stop sending out emails? Did your deliverability score decrease drastically? Or did people unsubscribe?

Find out what happened so you can avoid similar issues in the future.

2. Create an email calendar

Now that you know what the problem was it’s time to get back into the swing of things. Plan how many emails you want to send out and when. 

Also, plan what content you will send out. Make sure to alternate between value emails and emails that pitch a product or service. 

You might also want to study the demographics and psychographics of your subscribers and tailor your emails to their needs.

3. Send them a free gift

Give your subscribers something for free to reactivate their interest. Just make sure that the free gift is actually valuable to them. Ideally, overdeliver and give them something so good that you could easily sell it. They will love it and it instantly boosts the relationship with your list.

How do you write a reactivation email?

The reactivation email is the first email you send after you have been silent. Keep in mind that even if you write the perfect reactivation email, there will always be people who unsubscribe. It’s better to get rid of those people as they wouldn’t buy from you anyway. 

Make unsubscribing easy for them. If you hide the unsubscribe button they might flag your email as spam which is a lot worse for your deliverability score. 

Anyway, how do you write a reactivation email?

  1. Pick an interesting subject line. This will ensure that they actually open the email.
  1. Tell them what to expect. Your subscribers haven’t heard from you in a while. Tell them why and what they can expect from you in the future. Also, tell them how often you’ll send out emails and allow them to unsubscribe. 
  1. Send more than one email. Don’t send one mail and think it’s done. Gradually reactivate your list by sending emails consistently.

How do I reengage my cold email list?

There is a difference between an email list that was never used or an email list that you stopped using after a while.

If you never sent out emails at all, your subscribers aren’t used to receiving emails from you.

If you used to send out emails but stopped, subscribers might be confused why you disappeared.

Still, there are a few things you can use in both scenarios to reengage a cold email list.

#1 Reintroduce yourself

Your subscribers probably have no idea who you are and why they subscribed to you. Worse even, you might have gotten new subscribers while you were gone.

As a best practice, reintroduce yourself. Tell them what to do and what they’ll get from your emails. 

#2 Keep it valuable

What exactly will be valuable to your readers depends on your list. But the point is, don’t just send them sales-y emails all the time. Tell stories, share helpful information, and don’t even include a link once in a while.

#3 End each email with a clear call to action

Train your subscribers to perform certain tasks such as replying to your email or clicking a link. This will help you to monetize your list later.

Activate your underused email list in minutes

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