Do you use Aweber? Just a few killer tips here.

Delete Duplicate Subscribers from your List

I know some of you have the same person (email address) in more than one Aweber list. Why? Because you probably use more than one opt-ins and offer different resources/downloads as part of opting-in. So, after they opt-in they get added to a separate list with different follow-up series.

In certain cases, you have a reason to keep them in multiple lists because each list has a totally separate funnel journey. In other cases, having them on the same or multiple lists makes no difference so you may consider removing duplicate addresses. Remember, Aweber charges for the total number of subscribers in all your lists without looking at duplicates.

You know exactly in which lists you may consider removing duplicates. There are the ones which you always include in your regular campaigns by ticking the boxes, remember? So, if you regularly send campaigns to the exact same lists like below, you may want to get rid of the duplicates.

• Take a note of the lists that you want to remove the duplicates from.
• Choose the 1st list and click on the Subscribers tab at the top.

• Scroll down and click on Export csv.

• Open up the csv and copy the whole column with the email addresses in your list.
• Go back to Aweber, choose the 2nd list (from the lists you’ll unsubscribe the duplicates), scroll further down and click on the Bulk Unsubscribe tool.

• Paste the copied addresses in the relevant area shown below:
• DON’T CHECK the Unsubscribe from all lists box as it will delete the addresses from all lists! You don’t want that, do you?
• Click Unsubscribe.
• What’ve you’ve done so far is you’ve unsubscribed the subscribers that lived in the 1st list and were also in your 2nd list. Next, you have to unsubscribe the ones that live in the 1st list and are also in the 3rd list, 4th list, and so on.
• Select the 3rd list from the top, click again Bulk Unsubscribe, paste the same copied addresses from the 1st list, and click Unsubscribe. Now, you’ve unsubscribed the ones that lived in both the 1st and 3rd list. Do the same for all the remaining lists, so you unsubscribe the ones that live in both in the 1st list and n-th list. Visually, you’ll end up with something like this:

• Then, we do the exact same process starting from the 2nd list and going to the right up to the n-th list. The first that will be deleted will be the yellow duck above.
• Repeat until you remove the duplicates between the (n-1)th list and n-th list.

Optional note for maths freaks: As you understand, the bulk unsubscribe steps required are [latex] S_1 = (n-1) + (n-2) + … + 1.[/latex] That’s an arithmetic series from 1 to (n-1). The formula of the arithmetic series is [latex] S = \frac{n(n+1)}{2} [/latex]. So, if you substitute n with n-1, you get that [latex] S_1 = \frac{n(n-1)}{2}[/latex] Basically, it’s the formula that solves the common handshake problem. If you have [latex]n[/latex] people in a room and all want to give a handshake to everybody else, how many handshakes will they give in total? Since everybody gives a handshake to everybody else, that’s [latex]n(n-1)[/latex] but that moment that A handshakes B, B also handshakes A, so divide the thing by 2, ie. [latex] S_1 = \frac{n(n-1)}{2}[/latex].

Just one thing to close this. A better way to group subscribers together rather than using different lists is tags. Check this out.

Delete a List of Subscribers at Once

In a previous article, I showed you how you can identify disposable addresses in your list using Python. Let’s say you came up with a list of 50 disposable addresses and you want to delete all of them in Aweber. How do you do that?

• Copy all your addresses from an excel file, doc, or txt file.
• Go to the relevant list and use the Unsubscribe tool as above.
• Paste all the addresses and click Unsubscribe.
• After you unsubscribe, choose all the unsubscribed ones in that list and click Delete:

So, to delete a list of subscribers you just have to unsubscribe them first and then delete.

Set up SPF authentication for Aweber

Domain Authentication is necessary if you want to improve your deliverability and reach your subscribers’ inbox. If you use Aweber for sending out your emails you have to modify your SPF TXT record in your host’s DNS and include Aweber there. In other words, you say to the ISP’s:

“Hey, Gmail, Yahoo, Outlook, Any Mail Server, …, if you receive an email from my_name@my_domain.com coming from an Aweber IP, you can safely accept it and send it to your clients’ inbox because… look! Aweber is authorised to send emails on behalf of my domain! They’re included in the SPF record there in my domain’s DNS!”

Got it?

If you use Google Suite to send your emails and Aweber for your campaigns you have to update your SPF record to:

v=spf1 include:send.aweber.com include:_spf.google.com ~all

You must have only one SPF in which you aggregate all the IP’s that are authorised to send emails on behalf of your domain.

This is a useful tutorial in Aweber regarding domain authentication.

Capture Reasons for Unsubscribing

Every time someone unsubscribes has the option to leave a comment with the reason they unsubscribe. To receive all these comments you have to enter an email address in the relevant list’s options.

• Select a list.
• Go to List Settings.

• Scroll to the Bottom and you’ll see an option to add an email address for notifications.

I know that it’s a pain because you will not only see when somebody unsubscribes but also when they subscribe. You then need to filter the emails in your email client and pull up only the unsubscribes and go through to find unsubscribe reasons.

Make it Easy for them to Unsubscribe

Guys, I’ll keep saying that. Make it really really easy for people if they want to unsubscribe from your list. Don’t just have that option in tiny 6 font hidden down there under your addresses. Include a link on the top of your content before your “Hey there” salutation. This is how you can add a link on the top to make it really easy to unsubscribe if you use Aweber.