If you have spent any real time on email marketing, you know how much work goes into growing a subscriber list, and into crafting campaigns worth opening. That is why it stings when subscribers go quiet, with open and click rates sliding downward.
Invesp (2021) found that attracting a new customer costs five times more than keeping an existing one. That alone makes a strong case for putting energy into your lapsed subscribers before writing them off.
The good news is that re-engagement campaigns work. Research Path found that 45% of subscribers who receive a win-back campaign go on to engage with future emails from the same brand. A re-engagement or win-back campaign is a short series of emails sent with one goal: turn inactive subscribers back into active ones.
Here are the key things to get right.
Segment first
Before you send anything, identify who you are targeting. An inactive subscriber is generally someone who has not opened or clicked any of your campaigns in a set period. Campaign Monitor (2021) puts that threshold at around six months, which is a reasonable starting point.
Once you have saved that segment in your platform, you can target it precisely without touching the rest of your list. Good segmentation also protects your sender reputation by keeping your re-engagement sends separate from your regular campaigns.
Choose your campaign angle
As we covered in a previous post, Rekindle the spark with your subscribers, there are three common win-back angles:
- Remind them why they signed up
- Offer a solution to a problem they have
- Give them something of genuine value
Pick the angle that fits your brand and your audience. A discount works for e-commerce. A useful piece of content might work better for a B2B list.
Keep your content short and direct
When your win-back email lands, it needs to earn attention quickly. Keep the content concise and limit yourself to a single call to action. One clear next step is easier to act on than three competing ones.
Campaign Monitor (2019) recommends a more conversational tone for re-engagement emails than you would use in a standard campaign. Write like you are addressing a real person, not broadcasting to a list. That shift in register tends to lift engagement.
Test your subject lines
Subject lines are often the last thing people think about, but for a win-back campaign they carry extra weight. A subscriber who has ignored your last several emails is only going to open this one if the subject line gives them a reason to.
If you are unsure what will land, run an A/B split test. Send two subject line variations to a portion of the segment, then send the winner to the rest. It takes a little extra setup but it removes the guesswork.
Know when to let go
Not every inactive subscriber will come back, and that is fine. Holding onto contacts who never engage hurts your deliverability and skews your reporting. Before you remove anyone, give the process a fair run. Send two to three win-back campaigns before calling it.
For subscribers who still do not respond, a clean removal keeps your list healthy and your sender reputation intact.
If you have questions about re-engagement or want advice on setting up a win-back campaign, get in touch with us.
Blog post written by: Natasha Steele-Smith
Frequently asked questions
- How long should a subscriber be inactive before I target them in a win-back campaign?
- Campaign Monitor suggests six months of no opens or clicks as a reasonable threshold. You can adjust this based on your typical sending frequency, but six months is a widely used starting point.
- How many win-back emails should I send before removing a subscriber?
- Send at least two to three campaigns before removing an unresponsive contact. Removing people too quickly means you may miss subscribers who simply had a quiet period.
- Do re-engagement campaigns actually work?
- Research Path found that 45% of subscribers who receive a win-back campaign go on to engage with future emails from the same brand, which makes a strong case for running them before removing inactive contacts.
- What call-to-action approach works best in a re-engagement email?
- Stick to a single call to action. Multiple competing links dilute focus and reduce the chance of a click. Make the one action you want obvious and easy to take.