The Great Migration! 🦅 Are You Ready?

If you’ve managed email lists or owned a newsletter you’ve inevitably come across or are about to be face-to-face with the dreaded email list migration to a new platform.

There are a million reasons we come to this decision:

• My email delivery is in the tank…

• I need to find a cheaper solution…

• I need more features…

• The reporting sucks…

Whatever your reason, the biggest issue you will face is successfully transitioning your email list, so that you maintain great deliverability and continue or start hitting the inbox.

Follow the guide below that my data analyst AJ and I put together.

We follow this same process every time we migrate a list to a new platform.

Full Proof Guide To Migrating Your Email List!

When migrating your email list to a new Email Service Provider (ESP) you must plan very carefully.

Let’s walk through each step below to ensure a seamless transition without disrupting your audience’s experience or your email deliverability.

Step 1: Warm-up Schedule

Coordinate with your new ESP to understand their specific warm-up recommendations to avoid any deliverability issues.

The warmup schedule should look similar to this.

This will tell you how many subscribers you should be sending to per day during the migration.

Step 2: Round-Up Your Unsubs and Complainers

You need to import all subscribers who have either complained or unsubscribed from your email list to the new ESP.

This is a 100% requirement to be CANSPAM Compliant!

Create your segment which looks similar to this below:

Import these subscribers as unsubscribed (you will have to check with your new ESP how to mark them as so).

Step 3: Segment Your Subscriber Base

Segmenting your subscribers is crucial for successfully migrating your email list without a hiccup.

You want to start with your most engaged, longest-running subscribers as they are the least likely to mark your emails as spam, while actively engaging with your content, which helps to establish your reputation on the new platform.

The High-Engagement Segment:

• HAS NOT EVER UNSUBSCRIBED

• HAS NOT EVER COMPLAINED

• ADDED BEFORE 90 DAYS AGO

• HAS CLICKED IN LAST 7 DAYS

Here is an example from one of our platforms.

If we were migrating this email list, we would start with these 64K+ subscribers.

Step 4: Clean and Validate The Data

Every time you export data and are going to migrate it over to a new ESP, it’s best practice to have your data validated to make sure you aren’t moving any emails that have gone bad over time.

I’ve mentioned in previous newsletters how to validate your data. Here are some quick links to email validation services.

• Email Oversight

• BriteVerify by Validity

• ZeroBounce

• NeverBounce

• Xverify

Step 5: Prevent Double Sending

To avoid sending duplicate emails from both your old and new ESPs, you must be sure to suppress every subscriber you add to the new platform on your current platform.

Start by creating an exclusion list on your current ESP.

As you migrate subscribers to your new ESP, add those same subs to the exclusion list on your current ESP.

Follow these steps exactly:

1. Based on your warmup schedule grab the exact number of subs needed from your High-Engagement segment. (i.e. Day 1, 500 subscribers) and save as Migration-Day-1-500.csv.

2. Import these subs (i.e. 500 subscribers) into your exclusion list on your current ESP.

3. Once import is completed (make 100% sure), import the same file to your new ESP.

You will repeat this process each day until you have successfully migrated your entire High-Engagement subscribers.

PRO TIP: Use the same file naming protocol for the migration, so you can easily keep track of where you are at in the process.

IMPORTANT REMINDER: IMPORT INTO the Exclusion List FIRST on your current ESP, to ensure you don’t double-send to the same subscriber from both ESP’s.

Step 6: Remaining Subscriber Migration

Once your most engaged subscribers have been successfully migrated and the new ESP’s reputation is established it’s time to gradually migrate the rest of your subscribers.

Expand Your Segments

Start migrating less active users by gradually loosening the engagement criteria.

First, include subscribers who were “Added Over 90 Days Ago and Have Clicked in the Last 30 Days.”

• HAS NOT EVER UNSUBSCRIBED

• HAS NOT EVER COMPLAINED

• ADDED BEFORE 90 DAYS AGO

• HAS CLICKED IN LAST 30 DAYS

Then, remove the added filter and get anyone who “Have Clicked in the Last 7 Days.”

• HAS NOT EVER UNSUBSCRIBED

• HAS NOT EVER COMPLAINED

• HAS CLICKED IN LAST 7 DAYS

Followed by, all subscribers who “Have Clicked in the Last 30 Days.”

• HAS NOT EVER UNSUBSCRIBED

• HAS NOT EVER COMPLAINED

• HAS CLICKED IN LAST 30 DAYS

Next, get subscribers who “Have Opened in the Last 180 Days and Have Ever Clicked.”

• HAS NOT EVER UNSUBSCRIBED

• HAS NOT EVER COMPLAINED

• HAS OPENED IN LAST 180 DAYS

• HAS CLICKED EVER

Now, add the rest of your clickers “Have Ever Clicked.”

• HAS NOT EVER UNSUBSCRIBED

• HAS NOT EVER COMPLAINED

• HAS CLICKED EVER

Finally, add the rest of your openers “Have Ever Opened.”

• HAS NOT EVER UNSUBSCRIBED

• HAS NOT EVER COMPLAINED

• HAS OPENED EVER

Anyone else who doesn’t fall into these segments, isn’t worth migrating over as it would just be added costs for you with no value in return.

IMPORTANT REMINDER: 100% ensure the remaining migration segments are validated with an email validation service. Especially the last two segments where the activity is not recent.

Monitor and Adjust

Keep a close eye on your engagement metrics and any deliverability issues. Adjust your strategy as needed based on the performance data and feedback from the new ESP.

Pro Tips for a Successful Migration

Verify Sender Requirments: Make sure your DNS records are properly setup on the new ESP, based on the Sender Requirments established by Gmail, Yahoo, Aol, etc. I wrote an entire newsletter on it here - “Email Deliverability… $h!t’s About To Hit The Fan!”

Test Thoroughly: Test extensively before going live on the new ESP to ensure that everything from email templates to automated workflows functions correctly on the new platform.

Backup Data: Ensure you have complete backups of all your lists, campaigns, and reports from your original ESP.

Remember, migrations can get complicated, as each ESP has different segmenting options and importing capabilities.

Please… if you have any questions about an email list migration reply to this email and I will get back to you as soon as I can.

Time to move,
Chris Miquel

Follow me on Twitter: @miqchris