Unsubscribing: Why are companies still getting it wrong?

We’ve come a long way and it’s taken for granted that companies now include an unsubscribe option within their email communications. However, it still surprises me how many make this such a tricky process, e.g. making you login to edit your preferences (if I could remember my password, I probably would, but by then I’ve already lost interest/concentration…)  I won’t name names, yet some of those still not offering a one-click unsubscribe mechanism are big retailers who probably should know better.  This is a good blog post from Econsultancy looking at the main UK retailers’ unsubscribe processes so they’ve happily done the research for me, thank you Graham Charlton.

So why is this important? I’m a good natured kind of guy, so I tend not to click the ‘this is spam’ button. However, I’m in the email industry and am therefore not the norm, but for those that do, this results in the sender having high complaint rates which, put simply, result in poorer deliverability. People just won’t accept that they have to keep receiving these emails. Why it’s so frustrating for people like myself is that this is actually one of the less complicated areas of email marketing: a clear unsubscribe link with a one-click process. That really is it.

In addition to the above, companies are now able to make this even easier through the provision of a ‘List-Unsubscribe’ header. A simple process, this allows for an additional link within the header that has no impact on the creative sent.

Easy to do, obvious benefits for delivery and a tick with the ISPs, it seems to be a no brainer to me and something that you should definitely be talking to your ESP about.