A database has no value by itself: it is an asset like any other. For a factory, the value of a machine is not its cost of acquisition, but the total benefits it brings over the time of use, less the initial price amortized and maintenance costs. A database is also part of our business machinery. 

Its value is equal to the potential gain for the shipment made to its members, always subtracting the costs associated with dedicated human time, shipping itself and the cost in terms of reputation. 

The latter cost should not be underestimated. It refers to the risk that an e-mail does not reach an interested contact (opportunity cost of its non-purchase) for having made previous shipments to recipients for which our mails are not relevant. The reputation of the sender, from the point of view of anti-spam, is conditioned by the reactions (openings, clicks, responses …) of the recipients. The disinterest, or worse, the annoyance felt by some of those recipients tarnishes the customer’s reputation and lowers the delivery rate.

Essential Rules

• Manage separately those who open and click on our emails
• Throw away everything that generates more costs than profits

It seems obvious to follow this process for any other activity but, as far as databases are concerned, it is usually an unacceptable practice since there are wrong psychological brakes.

Psychological braces to overcome

• The irrepressible and nonsensical taste for quantity: it seems more “professional” u2019 have 15000 contacts than 50
• The pain generated by throwing something for what we have paid with the feeling that it can generate income (although it costs more than we can contribute)

“In the last 6 months we have multiplied our conversions by four, thanks in part to the sending of our newsletter to the educational community and to the control we make of our database.”

Cleaning up an emailing database is not only eliminating bounces, but also saving only profitable contacts for our company. As a consequence, I recommend following the following steps to efficiently reduce our database:

1. Send the campaign: a personalized mail for each client that contains an editorial work and an ergonomic appropriate to the specific objective we pursue, as well as effective call-to-action, etc.
2. Forward a few days later the same email to contacts that have not opened it with notable changes in the header of the message (name, subject …) and / or at the time (time) of the sending.
3. Forward weeks later another message to those who did not open the first two emails with a purpose and a different editorial axis, for example an informative content message instead of a commercial email.
4. Send a direct message to those who have not opened a message asking, simply and directly, if they want to continue receiving our e-mails, perhaps proposing to reduce the frequency of sending.
5. Delete those who canceled your subscription (of course) but also all contacts that did not react to any of the previous submissions.

This rule must be a continuous process to control and optimize our database. Locating non-reactive recipients will allow us to move to more identified and relevant bases; In short, more profitable.