Email & newsletters ·
The list-size incentive is quietly costing newsletters their inbox placement
The one thing
A newsletter operator describes the tension precisely: a large segment with no opens in twelve months, a winback flow that is not working, and advertising sold against total list size. Archiving the dormant is obviously correct for deliverability and obviously costly for the rate card.
This is the most common unforced error in newsletter businesses, and it is structural rather than careless — the commercial model rewards a number that the deliverability model punishes. Twelve months is the specific danger zone: abandoned addresses get recycled into spam traps, so a year-dormant segment is not inert, it is a live risk to the subscribers who do open.
The fix is commercial before it is technical. Sell on engaged subscribers rather than total — a smaller number, a defensible one, and increasingly what advertisers ask for anyway. Then re-permission once and suppress.
Also worth knowing
- A separate thread shows the same programme shape from the other side: one welcome flow, everything else batch-and-blast to the whole list, and a plan to fix it with branching automation. The cheaper first move is splitting by engagement recency and mailing the lapsing segment less. Notably, deliverability was not among the concerns raised — which is usually where the cost is already being paid. (r/emailmarketing)
Quiet but watch it
- Both threads reach for open rate as the health metric. Post-Apple-Mail-Privacy that number is partly fictional, and segmentation decisions built on it are unreliable. Clicks carry the weight now.
2 stories in full
TLDR
- A newsletter operator describes the exact tension this channel creates: a large segment with no opens in 12 months, a winback flow performing poorly, and advertising sold against total list size.
- The instinct is to archive the disengaged; the commercial pressure is to keep them counted.
Why it matters
This is the most common unforced deliverability error in newsletter businesses, and it is structural rather than careless. Ad rates quoted on list size create a direct incentive to keep mailing people who never open — which degrades reputation with mailbox providers and reduces delivery to the engaged subscribers the advertiser actually wants.
The twelve-month figure matters specifically: abandoned addresses get recycled into spam traps, so a year-dormant segment is not merely inert, it is a live risk.
What to do
- Sell on engaged subscribers, not total. It is a smaller number and a defensible one, and advertisers increasingly ask for it anyway.
- Run one clear re-permission email, then suppress. Keep the records if you need the historical count.
- Segment your delivery metrics by mailbox provider before and after — the improvement usually shows up at Gmail first.
What's actually working for automated email flows right now beyond the basic welcome series?
r/emailmarketing ·
TLDR
- A practitioner asks what comes after the welcome series, having reached the common plateau: one automated flow, and everything else going to the whole list.
- The specific gaps named are behavioural segmentation rather than opens and clicks, branching sequences, joining purchase history to email activity, and keeping segments current without manual work.
Why it matters
Worth keeping because the question is the diagnosis. "One welcome flow plus batch-and-blast to everyone" is where the large majority of programmes actually sit, and the instinct to solve it with more automation usually produces complexity nobody maintains.
Also note what they did not ask about: deliverability. Sending every campaign to the whole list is the thing most likely to be quietly costing them inbox placement, and it is not on their list of concerns.
What to do
- Before building branching flows, split the list by engagement recency and reduce frequency to the lapsing segment. That is one rule and most of the benefit.
- Segment on clicks and purchases, not opens — post-Apple-Mail-Privacy, opens cannot carry that weight.