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Unsubscribe Links at the Top of Your Email Marketing Messages Are A Good Thing

by Fleiger Mail⁽¹⁾

Though it goes against best practices, some email marketers purposely make their unsubscribe link difficult to find, making the subscriber play a game of hide-and-seek. The reasoning behind this is simple - they don’t want their subscribers to leave and are willing to keep them at all costs.

Most email marketers place their unsubscribe link at the bottom of the email. This has become so common that it is often viewed as a standard. And there is nothing necessarily wrong about placing the link at that location. Placing it here does make sense, in both an aesthetic and practical sense. But there is a significant benefit to placing an additional opt-out link at the top of your email. If you place the link at the bottom because you are opposed to providing your subscribers with an easy out, you're not alone. Several marketers employ this trick, often praying that the reader never makes it to the very bottom of the message. Just because this tactic may help maintain the quantity of contacts on your list doesn’t make it the correct, or most profitable, thing to do. Placing the unsubscribe link at the top of the email is a more effective move and the habits of the average subscriber help prove this point.

Enter the Typical Email Recipient

In order to understand why having the unsubscribe link at the top is a smarter decision, I want you to put yourself in the mind of your subscriber. You sign up for a marketer’s email communications and after a few months, you decide that the relationship does not provide the value you were looking for or benefit you in any way. Combine this with the fact that you already regularly receive newsletters and general email from dozens of other people. At a certain point, you decide that you'd like to remove yourself from the mailing list, but this particular marketer has their unsubscribe link located at the bottom of the email. There are three variables that may prevent you from clicking the link:

1. Lack of Trust - Maybe you don’t exactly trust the marketer. This is understandable because spammers have been known to include unsubscribe links just to determine if the email address is valid and active. Click on the link, and there is a chance that you will only end up receiving more spam.

2. You Don’t Have Time - Another reason you avoid clicking the link could be because you are so swamped with email and everyday life, that you feel as if you just don’t have the time to look for it. The lazy factor is why such a large number of people put up with spam and businesses they don’t particularly care to hear from.

3. It’s a Complicated Process - The unsubscribe process can be very tedious. For example, some marketers force the subscriber to go through multiple steps just to stop receiving email. This can be so frustrating that you give up and start considering other actions.

All of these scenarios indicate to the subscriber that the unsubscribe process may be difficult and/or ineffective and, thus, could very well be a waste of time. As presented above, this generates a slew of negative feelings in your subscriber and puts your business in an unfavorable light in the customer's mind. If they distrust your business, they may distrust your products also. Putting the unsubscribe link at the top of the email (along with a short message telling the recipient that they are receiving the email because they signed up for the list and that they may unsubscribe at any time) indicates to the subscriber that you have the integrity to allow them to easily unsubscribe. And if they do unsubscribe, they may return at a later date with the confidence and trust that you'll let them go if that is their desire. It's just good customer relations.

The Evil Alternative to Unsubscribe

A customer who can’t locate the unsubscribe link may choose to report your email marketing material as spam and as a result, your email marketing campaigns could greatly suffer. Internet Service Providers actively block spammers from delivering email and could end up targeting your email traffic. This could easily happen to you even if you are not sending spam. If even a monor percentage of your email gets reported as spam, your reputation as a sender will be seriously damaged. The easy solution to the problem is to make as easy as possible for your subscribers to opt out of your email by including the unsubscribe link at the top of your message. It is a simple way to honor the wishes of your subscribers and more importantly, keep yourself out of trouble by maintaining your ability to effectively send your opt in email marketing campaigns.

Article submitted Tuesday, March 01, 2011 & read 40 times.

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