Before sending to an old list, ask yourself Why?. What is the goal of sending to this list again and why are you doing it now? Oftentimes, emails that have not engaged for over a year are considered unengaged/invalid, and sending to them can put your deliverability at risk.
If you decide that it is in your business’s best interest to send to these contacts again, here are some tips to help you get the most out of this list:
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Start slow. As these contacts are old and have not engaged with your brand in quite a while, there is no rush to contact them all at the same time. Break your list down into smaller lists and gradually send to them over time.
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Don’t put them back into your regularly scheduled campaign sends where you send to those who are already engaged with your brand. This old list of contacts has not heard from you in quite some time and might’ve forgotten about your brand. The content you send to this old list should re-introduce your brand and try to grab the subscribers attention.
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Make use of other data to see if it is worth reaching out to them again. For example, if an email has not had any interaction with your brand (i.e., no placed orders or active on site events) for quite some time, it may not be worth sending to them again.
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Re-target these contacts through other means. Make use of targeted ad channels (i.e., Facebook) to rebuild brand awareness/recognition before you start sending to this list.
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Clean out any potential invalid emails — especially organizational emails. Depending on how long it’s been since you last contacted this list, see if there are any organizational emails in the list and clean them out. For example, .edu (college emails) are normally only active for 4 years. If you have not reached out to this email in more than 4 years, it’s safe to say that the email address is no longer active. Another way to clean out your list is to make use of a list cleaning service. Our team highly recommends Kickbox.
