You Ghosted Your Email List. Now What?
Episode Overview
In this episode, Branda dives into what happens when you ghost your email list. Do you dust off the cobwebs, pretend nothing happened, or address your absence head-on? Tune in for tips to bounce back, assess your list's current state, craft a strategic re-engagement plan, and reconnect with your audience.
Tune in as Branda discusses:
Evaluating your list's current engagement after ghosting.
Crafting a strategic content plan to re-engage your audience.
Reconnecting with subscribers using tailored re-introduction strategies.
Mentioned in the episode:
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Days turned into weeks, and maybe even months, and now you’re not sure how to jump back into email marketing. Do you simply dust off the cobwebs? Pretend nothing ever happened? Or should you address the cause of your absence? Let’s talk about what you should do after you’ve ghosted your email list.
So, You’ve Ghosted Your List…
One of the most common questions I get as an email strategist is, “What should I do if I ghost my list?” It’s a common struggle, and it’s not hard to guess why. When life gets crazy or running a business becomes overwhelming, we start to drop the ball on marketing.
I’ll let you in on a secret: I’ve ghosted my list more than once. Even after I started my career as an email strategist, I ghosted my list for a month or two when I was swamped with work.
What to Do When You’ve Ghosted Your List
Of course, I don’t recommend ghosting your list. It can cause your subscribers to go cold, decrease your sales, and hurt your email engagement. But I also know shit happens. Instead of worrying about the consequences, let’s focus on getting your email marketing back on track.
#1 Assess the Situation
Before you write your next email, start by taking a peek inside your email marketing platform. How long has it been since your last email? If it’s been a few weeks, it’s much easier to jump back in because, while your subscribers may be cooling off, they aren’t cold yet. If it’s been a few months, there’s more work to do because you’ll need to reengage your list.
Next, you want to assess the situation. When you were emailing your list, how did things look? Was your list healthy? Were subscribers engaged? If yes, then again, that’s a signal that things might be easier to jump back into. But if your subscribers were already cold before you ghosted, you might need to take more drastic steps, like scrubbing your list.
Lastly, you want to look at your own business. Has your business pivoted or changed since your last email? For me, that was the situation around my ghosting. I was no longer happy with the emails I was sending, but I wasn’t sure which direction to go. If that’s the case for you, make sure you have a clear grasp of this new version of your business and where you’re headed before you begin emailing again.
#2 Make a Plan
I see a lot of business owners jump back in before they are fully ready, and they end up ghosting their list again a few weeks later. That looks flakey.
You want a content plan before you start emailing again. I recommend planning at least 30 days of content. That means not just when you’ll send the emails, but what topic you’ll focus on with each email. If you want to help yourself out, batch write those emails, so you don’t have an excuse not to send them later.
You also want to create a plan for the unexpected. If life gets busy again in the future or you’re struggling to keep up with your list, what are you going to do? Instead of ghosting your list, you can reuse old emails, repurpose other content, slow down your emailing frequency, or skip a week to help yourself catch back up.
#3 Jump Start Your Email List
You have a content plan, and now it’s time to get back into the inbox. How you kickstart this will depend on how long you’ve been absent.
If it’s only been 3 weeks or less since your last email, start with the first email in your content plan. You can say, “Oops, sorry I ghosted you for a second here, but I’m back.” And then just BE back. Don’t keep explaining yourself. Just start emailing, and let cold subscribers filter themselves out.
If it’s been a month or two, start with a check-in email. This isn’t part of your content plan. That’ll come next. This email just says, “Hey, sorry that I ghosted you. I’m going to be coming back. Here’s what I have planned. If you don’t want to remain on my list, here’s where you can unsubscribe.” Then, you’ll move into your content plan the following week.
If it’s been more than three months, start with a re-engagement series. This should be two to three emails reintroducing you and your business. Give your subscribers an idea of what to expect in your emails and give them the chance to leave. Once this reengagement series is done, you can start with your content plan.
Want to keep on chatting about email marketing? Take a listen to this episode, How Often Should You Email Your List? (You can also read the blog.) I’m giving you my suggested email frequency, plus why it matters in today's email marketing world.