You log into your email marketing program, log on to Instagram or check your Facebook page, and you realize that your likes/subscribes/followers number are down.
It’s always the same feeling of dread, it’s upsetting, and you wonder what you did to make people want to unfollow or unsubscribe from your content.
It can be disheartening, especially if it’s after a post or email that you cared so much about. You put your heart and soul into it, you shared your best bit of advice and it feels like people have rejected you.
I want to share an alternate way of looking at this situation.
When you’re doing marketing, you are always trying to pre-qualify people who could be potential clients. So you create an ad that only appeals to your target market, you ask qualifying questions on a call to see if they are a good fit, or you create content that only your target marketing should like.
However, what happens is somewhere along the way non-ideal clients join the list, follow you, engage with you. You might have had one post or opt-in that appealed to them and they signed up, and you got excited because your list/following grew.
What you don’t know is that this person (or group of people) actually are not your ideal client, they are never EVER going to buy from you, and for the last few weeks or months, they actually get frustrated seeing another piece of content from you that is of no interest to them.
One day, they decide to unsubscribe. This should be celebrated. As marketers (and yes, if you have a business you’re a marketer too) we are constantly trying to put our message in front of the right people. We spend good money reaching these people, we spend our time communicating with them.
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This person who has just unsubscribed is saving you from dealing with someone who is never going to be a client. If they’ve unsubscribed they have actively said I don’t want to work with this person/company – and that’s an amazing thing!
- They’ve saved you money – you no longer have to pay for them to be on your email list.
- They’ve saved your engagement – the post will never be seen and ignored by them again slowing down engagement rates.
- You no longer are talking to someone who doesn’t hear what you have to say – your content is only falling on the ears of those who want to hear from you.
- And at the end of the day, what use is having a follower if they aren’t interested in your content. It’s better to have a list of 100 people who love and adore your content than a list of 10,000 people who never want to work with you!
So, the next time you see that your numbers have dropped, I want you to celebrate, have a cupcake or a glass of wine, do a little dance, and celebrate the fact that you have successfully removed 1 (or 10) people who were never going to work with you anyway, so you can focus on the others who do!
Because at the end of the day, there are plenty of people who want what you offer!
