One of the most common reasons for people unsubscribing from email lists is 'too many emails'.
Email marketers have known this for a long time, but over-mailing seems to be creeping back in. Some email marketing service providers structure their pricing on the size of the email list, rather than number of emails sent, and this is perhaps why companies are tempted to think 'if it costs the same to send out 10,000 emails a month as 1,000, why don't we send 10,000?'
True, a direct response email sent twice a month can be yield more sales than if sent once a month. But finding the optimum frequency is important, because once you tip over into 'too many emails' then you lose good customers.
Here's an example - last weekend my husband was offered 2 free tickets to a concert in the Brighton Festival, which runs for the whole of May. We couldn't go, alas, but the person offering them said he often gets emails to say 'you've won 2 free tickets to ...'. 'We need to get on that list!' I told my other half. And he replied that he was probably already on the list, but because he gets upwards of two promotional emails a day from the Brighton Festival, he no longer opens any of them, but simply deletes.
Our loss? Maybe, but it made me think about all those emails going unopened. Sometimes more is less.
