How to craft a great unsubscribe experience

It’s way easier to sign up for email updates from random companies than you might think. If you make an online purchase, start a free trial, or join a community, there’s often an “opt in to marketing” checkbox—and sometimes, in the adrenaline rush of whatever you’re doing, you accidentally click it. 

Or maybe you genuinely thought you wanted to receive emails from a particular company, but after a few weeks, the content or the cadence just aren’t landing for you.

Whatever the reason, unsubscribing is part of the customer journey—and it’s something marketers should care about beyond just trying to avoid it. 

Why does the unsubscribe experience matter?

Though it may seem counterintuitive, the moment someone unsubscribes is a huge opportunity for marketers. Even though you’re losing a subscriber, you don’t have to lose brand equity or goodwill. The unsubscribe experience can make or break a customer’s feelings toward your brand—so here are a few things to keep in mind when building one. 

7 tips for creating a great unsubscribe experience

1. Make it easy to find

It’s tempting to bury your unsubscribe button at the bottom of your marketing emails, amid dense legal text and copyright information. And while that makes sense as a way to keep the focus on other CTAs—like making a purchase or reading new content—it’s not the best user experience.

At the minimum, try not to use tiny text for your unsubscribe button. That’s not accessible, and it makes the user feel as though you’re actively trying to make unsubscribing difficult. 

I love how this email from Oura approaches the unsubscribe link. While it’s still at the bottom, it’s not much smaller than all the other links—it’s just unbolded. Using bold text to draw attention to “positive” CTAs is much more accessible and friendly than using teeny tiny text to hide “negative” CTAs.

2. Don’t rely on dark patterns

Dark patterns—also known as deceptive design patterns—are designs meant to influence a user’s behavior, often by subtly tricking them into making choices they wouldn’t make otherwise. For example, a company might make the yearly subscription front-and-center on its pricing page but bury the monthly option deep in the FAQ.

Unsubscribe flows are often shaped by dark patterns; a common example is bolding the Yes, stay subscribed option rather than the option that will actually unsubscribe folks.

This unsubscribe text from a trendy furniture brand is a great example of dark patterns at work. At a glance, you might think that the first “unsubscribe” link will take you off their list. But if you read further—or click that link—that button will only remove you from promotional and product emails, not all marketing emails.

To be perfectly clear: please don’t do this. It’s not a good experience for a user to click what they think is the unsubscribe button, only to keep receiving emails. That’s the kind of experience that makes them think poorly of your brand. 

3. Nail the right vibe for the moment

As a creative who has written extensively for different brands throughout my career, I know how important brand voice is. You want to sound distinct and memorable—especially in your email marketing.

But be careful about dialing up your brand voice on functional text like unsubscribe buttons and links. Over-the-top language or language that doesn’t strike the right tone for the moment can be an instant turnoff. When people are unsubscribing, they’re trying to achieve something—so functional, clear language is always welcome. On top of that, they’re also likely coming into this brand interaction frustrated or unhappy (which is why they want to unsubscribe). Be mindful of those emotions, and choose language that meets them where they are.

4. Give options where appropriate

If your email marketing is more sophisticated, you probably have a few different content streams that you send to people. For example, you might have a monthly product newsletter, a promotional email that goes out every Friday, and other announcements that you send as needed. 

Instead of offering folks only a blanket unsubscribe option, it can be helpful to offer options—like this unsubscribe page from American Express. Not only does it give the user a choice about what kinds of emails they want to receive (or not receive), but it also explains what kinds of content each of those email streams involves. 

Sometimes, companies will put this behind a separate link or button that invites users to “manage their email preferences,” but it’s helpful to put it all in one place. And even if you don’t give people options, make sure you’re clear about what emails they can’t opt out of—like transactional emails related to their account or shipment updates. 

5. Offer an opportunity to give feedback—but make sure it’s truly optional

Understanding why people unsubscribe is key to refining your email marketing. But don’t use an unsubscribe survey as a way to delay people from actually unsubscribing. Make sure it’s really, truly optional—don’t force people to select a reason in order to stop receiving emails.

You can even put your unsubscribe survey on the confirmation page so that folks don’t see it until they know they’ve been unsubscribed, like in the example above. This is a great way to still collect important info from your customers without creating an artificial barrier or dark pattern that makes unsubscribing unpleasant.

6. Unsubscribe people immediately

More than once, I’ve unsubscribed from emails only to be told my updated preference would take up to two weeks to take effect.

It goes without saying—but I’ll say it anyway—that this isn’t a great user experience. Removing someone from an email list (even a big one) isn’t particularly challenging, and in most cases, the process can be automated. 

7. Make sure the whole experience works

I recently went to unsubscribe from an email newsletter and was greeted with this screen when I clicked the link.

The link is broken, which means I can’t unsubscribe unless I go to their website, manage to remember my account credentials, and navigate an entire dashboard. That’s a pretty onerous user experience.

It doesn’t matter how easy to find, friendly, or customizable your unsubscribe experience is if it doesn’t work. Check your links periodically to make sure they’re up to date.

Be great to your users, even when they’re opting out

Brand loyalty isn’t a one-and-done effort. It’s built over time, as the smallest customer experiences compound and shape sentiment. So keep a customer-first mindset, even when they’re choosing to opt out of your marketing. In the long term, crafting a positive user experience is way more valuable than keeping low-intent, annoyed people on your mailing list. 

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