Since the dawn of time marketers have been asking this question . . . OK well maybe not since the dawn of time, but it is a question that has puzzled marketers for years.
The issue being that someone has actively signed up to your marketing campaigns, wanting to receive marketing messages from you, to only opt out again soon after. Why would they opt in, to only unsubscribe again? That’s like ordering a pizza and never picking it up, who would do such a thing?
This is a major issue that affects both email and SMS marketing, and unfortunately the day will never come where people don’t unsubscribe from marketing messages. You could be sending amazing and engaging messages, ensuring you offer value every time, and not harassing them with multiple messages in a short space of time, but you will still find people opting out.
One thing we can do is determine why people are opting out and try and minimise this as much as possible.
Why people opt out
Even though the stats in the above image are just for emails, the reasons are still closely related to SMS, which is why we have expanded on each and added one more that we know is a huge reason for the percentage of unsubscribes.
Too many messages
Unfortunately, this is still a far too common reason for people unsubscribing. Businesses get over excited when they see great results, and start to send customers messages all the time.
No longer interested
This is a common one, the user signed up with all good intent on reading your messages, but soon got bored and unsubscribed.
Don’t recognise brand
This area is more for email marketing than SMS marketing. Because the majority of emails get sent to spam, recipients may not have actually read your email for several months even years, so when they click in their spam folder and read one of your emails, it was such a long time ago that they signed up, they have completely forgotten your brand.
Signed up on an incentive
One huge reason to why people unsubscribe is because they only opted in was to receive an offer. They never really intending on reading any of your messages anyway.
What you can do to minimise opt outs
Even with those 4 overwhelming reasons why people opt out, there are still actions that marketers can take to try help bring the number of unsubscribes down.
Too many messages
When sending each marketing message, you should think about if this will benefit the customer, or are you just sending it for the sake of it. A good way to know how often you can contact people is to ask them, give them the option to select how often they want you to message them.
No longer interested
Consumers will lose interest very quickly if your content isn’t meaningful to them. Yes, blanket marketing messages are easier to set up and send, but to keep interest high you need to do targeted campaigns. Split your data into what each subscriber is interested in and send them more meaningful messages. Not only will this help your unsubscribe rate, but because the content is more targeted, the recipient will be more receptive to your message, which will help conversion rate.
Don’t recognise brand
Fortunately for SMS there is no spam box, which means this as well as an amazing 98% open rate, your message will be read. So, make sure you keep in constant contact with customers, and send them at least 1 message every 6-8 weeks. Any less and consumers will forget about you very quickly. And make sure you have your Sender ID set to your business name.
Signed up on an incentive
Yes, offering an incentive like 40% off or a free gift on sign up is a great way to get more subscribers, but ultimately the people who do subscribe because of this aren’t interested in receiving more marketing messages from you.
Instead of offering an incentive when they sign up, tell them the benefits they would get if they signed up. Like monthly exclusive offers, early access to tickets/events, exclusive competitions and more. You want to tell them that if they sign up and stay on the list, they will receive great content and amazing offers forever.
If you don’t already send SMS marketing messages to your customers, why not sign up and try our online SMS platform today. Is simple to use and perfect to send personalised marketing messages in bulk. To test the platform, we will give you some free credits and one of our team will be more than happy talk you through the platform and create a plan dedicated to you.