You’d think that placing your opt-out link on the top of your emails might sound crazy, but it’s been proven to reduce ISP spam complaints by 75%. That’s impressive, for any marketer! Spam complaints can kill your business by blacklisting your IP, or worse yet, your block. It’s much better to have someone opt-out instead of reporting you for spam. I’ll explain how you can apply this advice.

Burying the opt-out link kills your deliverability.

I’ve seen so many marketers bury, hide or fail to include their unsubscribe link; I have no mercy and enjoy reporting them for spam. ISPs err on the side of their users and assign negative reputation points against the sender’s IP and eventually blacklists it. The lamest tactic I’ve seen shady marketers do more often is to bury the unsubscribe link with multiple lines.

Doing this will net you major losses — angry users, ISP complaints, corrective action from the email service provider and just makes you look like a marketing newbie. Step your game up, remove the excess lines and watch the ISP spam complaint drop down a bit.

Include the opt-out link on the top and avoid 75% ISP complaints.

Very respectable email marketing provider, StreamSend, published a statistic on their blog regarding senders who included their unsubscribe link on the top of their email reflected an astonishing 75% drop in spam complaints! As you can imagine, this can be a risky move because you don’t want to encourage opt-outs, but you want to ’sell it’ in the sense that it’s a better alternative to reporting your message as spam to the ISP.

In light of increasing interest in wondering how to meet the needs of subscribers without marginalizing the content of the email. Experts agree, a link on the top results in fewer complaints and happier users since they can opt-out without needing to scroll down in a message.

Will more opt-outs happen? Absolutely — but those people aren’t getting value from your marketing. Let them go peacefully. The 5% or so of your list who opts out place you at risk to being unable to reach the 95% who are expect your communications. Think of it as an ethical way to clean your list with every email you send.

Remember, sending to a loyal and happy subscriber list of 3000 beats the heck out of having an upset, confused and angry 10,000. Be smart and respect your subscribers’ time so they can respect your marketing.

How to Include Your Unsubscribe Link at the Top of Infusionsoft E-Mail:

It’s easy to implement a very attractive and consumer-friendly opt-out link within your email marketing in Infusionsoft.

1. Login to your Infusionsoft application.
2. Access your email templates through the Setup menu then choose Template Library.
3. Choose the email template you would like to change.
4. Click within the top of your email template so the cursor indicates your desired position.
5. Click Open Merge Window, a new window (pop-up will appear).
6. Select the Misc tab.
7. Click Create Update / Opt-Out.
8. Create your desired unsubscribe link and messaging. I recommend setting the Link Text similar to something like, “Unsubscribe or update your delivery preferences.”
9. Select the Actions tab, and add any actions such as tagging contacts appropriately.
10. Click Save, then Insert the opt out link along the top. I recommend setting the context for the link with a blurb like, “Don’t like this e-mail?” so recipients are empowered to make the right decision.

I know it sounds long, but it comes from the angle that you aren’t implementing custom unsubscribe links in your email marketing. Whether or not if you use custom opt-out links, Infusionsoft will always ensure that your emails exceed CAN-SPAM compliance by including your postal address and an automatic opt-out link at the bottom.

Naturally, it helps to be relevant and set the right expectations from the moment of opt-in, in order to keep your spam complaints to a minimum. Moving your unsubscribe link to the top won’t fix everything, it’s about sender practices. Trust me when I say that this is not the time to be mislead prospects in order to put email in their face… they are in control of their inbox and aren’t afraid to report messages as spam.

The whole point of this is to respect your audience, respect their choices and don’t lead them down an obstacle course when they tune you out. It’s okay, not everyone wants your email. Without respect, your audience means nothing because in the end, you don’t mean anything. I hope you apply some of these principles so you can maintain and improve the loyalty of your customers and prospects via your email marketing.

FREE WEBINAR: EMAIL DELIVERABILITY — APRIL, 22 2009 4PM ET
Just as a reminder, we’re hosting a free email marketing Webinar titled, “Don’t Pee in the Pool: The Keys to Achieving Excellent Email Deliverability,” led by Marc Chesley. Sign up and learn best practices in email marketing, industry guidelines and how you can increase your email deliverability. Learn more and sign up today at http://www.infusionsoft.com/emaildeliverability.

You might also like these blog entries:

• Why Do Email Messages Go to Spam?
• Customize Your Unsubscribe Links Effectively in Infusionsoft
• Spam Got You Down? (We Don’t Like Spam!)