Episode 87: I Emailed a Sale and They Unsubscribed. What Now?

Summary

The Email Sound Booth with Liz Wilcox Episode 87: I Emailed a Sale and They Unsubscribed. What Now? Release Date: February 4, 2025

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Introduction

In Episode 87 of The Email Sound Booth, Liz Wilcox addresses a common challenge faced by online business owners: experiencing an increase in email unsubscribes after sending out a sales email. Drawing inspiration from a listener's email, Liz provides actionable strategies to navigate this situation effectively and turn it into an opportunity for growth.

1. Embrace Unsubscribes as a Natural Part of Selling

Liz begins by reinforcing that experiencing unsubscribes after sending sales emails is both expected and beneficial for your business.

"The more you sell, the more unsubscribes you are going to get. But guess what? This is a good thing."
— Liz Wilcox [02:15]

She emphasizes that unsubscribes help in "letting the dead weight drop off," allowing you to focus your efforts on a more engaged and profitable audience. By accepting that not everyone will be a perfect fit, you can maintain a healthier and more responsive email list.

2. Keep Selling Without Pleasing Everyone

Continuing from the previous point, Liz advises business owners to persist with their sales efforts despite the rise in unsubscribes.

"It is not your job as a business owner to please everyone. It is your job as a business owner to find and serve the people that need what you sell."
— Liz Wilcox [05:40]

She likens the process to dating, explaining that not every connection will lead to a lasting relationship. By maintaining focus on those who do engage, you ensure that your energy and resources are directed towards customers who truly value your offerings.

3. Optimize Your Welcome Sequence

Liz highlights the importance of setting clear expectations from the outset through your welcome email sequence.

"Make sure they know you are going to sell to them. Make sure they know you are an actual business with real solutions that, yeah, cost money."
— Liz Wilcox [09:10]

She suggests incorporating a statement within the welcome sequence that communicates your intention to offer both free and paid products. This transparency helps mitigate surprise unsubscribes when sales emails are eventually sent, as subscribers are already aware of the forthcoming offers.

4. Implement a Tripwire Strategy

To further align subscriber expectations, Liz recommends introducing a tripwire—a low-cost or heavily discounted product offered immediately after someone subscribes.

"A tripwire is a short sales page for a heavily discounted product immediately after someone subscribes to your newsletter."
— Liz Wilcox [13:25]

This approach not only confirms the business’s intent to sell but also primes subscribers for future offers. By presenting value upfront at a minimal cost, you establish trust and reduce the likelihood of unsubscribes when subsequent sales emails are sent.

5. Prioritize List Growth

Acknowledging that selling will invariably lead to some unsubscribes, Liz underscores the necessity of consistently growing your email list.

"Growing your email list should be your number one priority because, yeah, every time you sell, and I hope you sell a lot, people are going to unsubscribe."
— Liz Wilcox [17:50]

She draws an analogy to refueling a car, explaining that just as you need to keep adding gas to keep driving, you must continually add new subscribers to sustain and grow your business. Focusing on list building ensures that the natural attrition from unsubscribes is offset, maintaining a robust and engaged audience.

Conclusion

In this insightful episode, Liz Wilcox provides a comprehensive framework for handling unsubscribes resulting from sales emails. Her key recommendations include:

1. Embrace Unsubscribes: Recognize them as a natural and positive part of refining your audience.
2. Continue Selling: Focus on serving your ideal customers rather than trying to please everyone.
3. Optimize Welcome Sequences: Set clear expectations about future sales to reduce surprise and dissatisfaction.
4. Use Tripwires: Implement low-cost offers early to align subscriber expectations.
5. Focus on List Growth: Maintain and expand your email list to compensate for inevitable unsubscribes.

By adopting these strategies, business owners can transform the challenge of unsubscribes into an opportunity for building a more engaged and profitable email list.

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For more insights on list building and effective email marketing strategies, consider exploring Liz Wilcox's resources and workshops available in the show notes.

Transcript

[A]

What is up? Liz Wilcox here, the fresh princess of email marketing. You are listening to episode 87 of the email Sound Booth podcast. Oh my gosh, we're almost at a hundred. We should do something to celebrate. Please let me know if you have any ideas on how to celebrate 100 episodes, because we're coming up in just a couple weeks. Anyway, this episode is inspired by an email that I received this morning. And it was. Someone said, you know, Liz, I did, I did the thing that you said to do. I, I sent a sales email to my email list and I got way more unsubscribes than normal. What say you like? What is next, Liz? And I've got, I got a few different ideas for you. So if you're in that boat, listen up because you likely, especially if you've been growing your lists, emailing your list, but you haven't sent that many sales emails. This is going to happen to you. I say it with love, but I also say it with certainty. The more you sell, the more unsubscribes you are going to get. But guess what? This is a good thing. So the first thing that you should do after you send a sales email and you get more unsubscribes than normal is to keep selling. Let the, I don't know, lack of a better term, dead weight. Let the dead weight drop off. If they are not going to buy from you, then, you know, do like NSync in 2001. Buy, buy, buy. Let them go. In the words of Queen Elsa, right? You are in business. Even if you are a charity, even if you're a nonprofit, listening, you need donors, right? And you know how little assets and resources you have. Whether you're a non profit working with a board that does it part time for free, or you're a small business owner and it's just you and your dog sitting at your desk all day. You don't have a lot of time to waste. And so I want you to get rid of the energy of people that won't buy from you. Let those unsubscribes go. I believe I have another podcast episode. I'll link it in the show notes. I can't remember what number it is, but it's all about how to let go of the sting of unsubscribes, right? So you can, you know, if that's really something that hurts your heart and your brain and makes you really discouraged, recommend checking out the show notes for that episode. But again, keep selling. It is not your job as A business owner to please everyone. It is your job as a business owner to find and serve the people that need what you sell, right? And at the end of the day, selling is a service, right? You didn't get in business, you know, to sell snake oil or whatever. You got in business because you really want to help people and you have a product or service that does that. So it is your job to go out and find those people. The people that unsubscribe you just, they found you and you found them and that just wasn't a match, right? We don't feel bad if we go on a first date and it's, you know, we don't get married after that, right? So, like, it's all good. So keep selling. Don't let it discourage you so much that you stop moving in the right direction because you need money, right? It's 2025 at the time of this recording, grocery prices have gone up. If you need a new car, you need fuel, you need this, you need that. It is expensive. So you have to keep selling. Okay? The second thing I want you to do is check your welcome sequence. This is going to help with unsubscribes and actually it might get you more unsubscribes in the beginning, but again, we want that dead weight out of there. You pay for your email list. We don't want all these people that are going to like, I can't believe she's selling to me. That's obnoxious. You're not being obnoxious. They're being obnoxious, okay? There, I said it. So check your welcome sequence. Make sure they know you are going to sell to them. Make sure they know you are an actual business with real solutions that, yeah, cost money. Because we live in a capitalist society. What do you expect, right? I'm getting, I'm getting freaking riled up here. I, I already love this episode. This might be my favorite. So check your welcome sequence. The first thing you want to do is somewhere in that sequence. If you don't have my templatized sequence or you haven't taken my welcome sequence workshop, just somewhere in there put this sentence. I am going to offer you free and paid products, paid resources, services, whatever word makes sense for you. This is going to flip the switch from oh, I just got a freebie to oh, this is a business with real solutions. Okay, that feels good, right? It's just a way of bringing it to the forefront of their mind. That way when you do sell, you don't get all Those unsubscribes or they see that and they unsubscribe right away. So you're not paying month after month after month for people that are never going to buy from you. Because that's the real obnoxiousness of it. All right, all right. The third thing I want you to do to curb this is to put in a trip wire. So a tripwire is a short sales page for a heavily discounted product immediately after someone subscribes to your newsletter. For example, if you subscribed to my welcome sequence freebie, instead of taking you to a thank you page, I take you to a sales page and I offer you my membership. My membership is already cheap. I don't discount it. And you know, you get to see it and it's like, hey, if you need those templates, you might need my weekly newsletter templates. Here it is, nine bucks, right? So it's just a way of, you know, letting people know, hey, I'm a business. I offer real solutions right from the start. Once you have a tripwire in place, you're going to get much less unsubscribes for the fact that you're selling. Okay? So really, if you don't have a trip wire, if you don't have a product, I recommend the first product you create is a tripwire. A low cost or something that can be heavily discounted. Create a very simple sales page. I'm going to link to Eden Freed. She has a course on tripwires. I love it. I took it way back in the day. I'm going to leave my affiliate link in the show notes for that. If you're interested in learning about tripwires. All right, and the last thing and the most important one of them all, when you email a sale and you get unsubscribes, what do you do next? Grow your list. Growing your email list should be your number one priority because, yeah, every time you sell, and I hope you sell a lot, people are going to unsubscribe. So it's kind of like, you know, putting gas in the car. Every time you turn on your car and you drive it, the gas tank is going to go lower to empty, right? But you refuel your car so you're car can keep moving. That's the exact same thing with your email list. Every time you email, especially sales, you're going to lose some gas, right? You're going to lose some people. So you need to keep refueling your list, right? So I really want you to focus on list building in the future from this very second on. The more you grow your list, especially when you keep selling. When you check that welcome sequence, when you put in a tripwire, then you get these fresh new leads in. They're gonna see the tripwire and know that you sell something. They're gonna see the welcome sequence again, know that you sell something. They're gonna see your sales emails, know that you sell something, right? There's gonna be less unsubscribes from there. So again, keep selling. Let the dead weight drop off. Check your welcome sequence. Make sure somewhere in there you're saying, I'm gonna offer you free and paid products. Put in that tripwire so people see a sales message from you immediately upon subscribing. And above all else, please, I'm begging you, grow your email list. It's so freaking important. It should be your number one priority this year. All right, that was episode 87. If you're interested more in list building and what to send people and how to sell to them in your newsletters, I'd love for you to join my nine dollar A membership email marketing membership. Actually, can I say membership one more time? Sure. Membership. It's nine bucks. I'd love for you to join today. Link in the show notes. As always, I am Liz Wilcox, and you are awesome. I'll see you in the next episode.