Everyone makes mistakes. Whether you’re sending an email a day, a week or a month, it’s likely that over time a mistake will slip through. Most of your subscribers will forgive a small slip every now and then. Everyone makes typos. We’re all human.
However, when you’ve experienced a data failure, a broken link or an issue that affects the quality or purpose of your email, your subscribers will expect that you’ll rectify your mistake. They’ll appreciate the effort you’ll go to acknowledge your mistake and move forward. It’s how you move forward that shows your subscribers how much you care.
Before you freak out at sending a less-than-perfect email, here are a few strategies for bouncing back from some common sending issues.
Images are wrong
If the image isn’t displaying or it’s wrong, you can re-host the image so that subscribers who open the campaign after you’ve rectified the issue will see the correct image. This is less effective the more time it takes to realise there’s an issue, but catching this early will mean that you can avoid most of your subscribers seeing the correct image.
A link isn’t working
Depending on the software you’re using, some platforms will allow you to replace the links after your send. However, if you need to re-send the campaign, the faster the better – it’s way better to own your mistake than deal with customer complaints.
The apology email
Emails with apologies in the subject line often have significantly higher open rates than regular sends, so much so that some companies are learning to purposely send incorrect information with a follow-up apology to boost open rates. While this is abusing the patience of your database, a genuine apology email can actually improve your standing with your subscribers when they can see you’re owning your mistake. Get creative with your subject line, this can be an opportunity to show-off a little personality – but don’t forget to fix the issue!
Also worth considering is how the mistake happened. If you’re having issues with your hosting or the person proofing didn’t check the links, this can be key to ensuring mistakes are rare occurrences. Good internal review processes are vital for ongoing campaign processes and worth investing time in.
Whatever the mistake you’ve made, the worst thing you can do is ignore it. Sending a follow-up, whether it’s an apology or an update or a full-scale resend, is the least you can do for your loyal and engaged subscriber base.
Need help bouncing back? Get in touch with us today.