You will learn
Learn about list cleaning for push notification subscribers, including why, how, and when to clean your lists.
Why clean push subscriber lists?
People who sign up for push notifications offer you a direct line of communication. Push notifications are more immediate than email and less restricted than SMS, which makes this channel an effective and easy way to contact your most loyal subscribers.
However, this doesn’t mean you should message your push subscribers indefinitely once they subscribe. Over time, some subscribers may lose interest in your messages and stop opening them. If someone stops engaging, this indicates that they are no longer interested in your push notifications, so you shouldn’t continue messaging them.
Sending push notifications to an unengaged subscriber may prompt them to unsubscribe from your notifications or delete your app from their devices entirely. They may also develop a bad impression of your brand and become less likely to shop with you in the future.
To avoid this, clean your push lists to ensure you are targeting your most engaged audience and respecting the preferences of those who have lost interest.
How to list clean
To clean your push list, take these key steps:
- Identify a segment of unengaged push subscribers.
- Create a push winback flow. Offer your unengaged push subscribers the opportunity to re-engage by clicking a push notification or opening your app.
- Create an exclusion segment for push subscribers who have completed your winback flow, but haven’t re-engaged.
- Exclude inactive subscribers from your campaigns on an ongoing basis.
For email and SMS, list cleaning involves removing consent for the channel a subscriber has disengaged from. There is currently no way to remove push consent in bulk. You also cannot remove a single push token from a profile; you can only exclude that person from future communications.
Create a winback segment
- Navigate to the Audience tab in Klaviyo.
- Click Lists & segments.
- Click Create List / Segment.
- Choose Segment.
- Create a segment with the following definition:
If someone can or cannot receive marketing > can receive > mobile push marketing
AND
What someone has done (or not done) > Received push > at least 3 times > in the last 30 days
AND
What someone has done (or not done) > Opened push > zero times > in the last 30 days
Your developer may implement additional custom push metrics, like “Active on app”. If you have access to a custom metric related to app activity, consider adding the following criteria to your segment:
AND
What someone has done (or not done) > Active on app > zero times > in the last 90 days
Re-engage subscribers via flows
Once you’ve identified your unengaged push subscribers, create a winback flow to re-engage them.
- Navigate to the Flows tab in Klaviyo.
- Click Create flow.
- Click Create From Scratch.
- Name your flow something clear like Push notification winback flow.
- In the menu What will trigger this flow? select Segment.
- In the menu Which segment will trigger this flow? choose the winback segment you created in the prior section.
- Add a Push block to your flow and customize it with a re-engagement message. For example, you can offer an incentive to open the message, like free shipping on their next order. Alternatively, ask your app users to update their preferences (e.g., notification frequency or type).
- If desired, add a time delay and additional messages.
- Once the flow is ready, click Update Action Statuses and set the flow live.
Sample re-engagement messages
Use these sample messages as inspiration for your re-engagement flow.
- We miss you! Shop now for free shipping, only in the app.
- Act fast! Shop in-app for 15% off, today only.
- Too many notifications? Let us know how often you want to hear from us.
Create a segment of inactive push subscribers
After your winback flow has run for several weeks, create a segment of subscribers who have completed the flow but still haven’t engaged with your messages.
- Navigate to the Audience tab in Klaviyo.
- Click Lists & segments.
- Click Create List / Segment.
- Choose Segment.
- Create a segment with the following definition:
What someone has done (or not done) > Received push > where Flow message = [your push winback message] at least once over all time
AND
What someone has done (or not done) > Opened push > zero times > in the last 45 days
Klaviyo recommends building a custom “Active on app” metric so you can include it in your inactive segment definition, similar to the winback segment you created above. Additionally, consider including criteria based on recent orders, like What someone has done > Placed Order > at least once in the last 45 days, as a recent order can indicate engagement.
As push subscribers re-engage (e.g., open transactional-style push messages or visit your app, if you track that), they are automatically removed from this segment. When you exclude this segment from push messages, you can be certain that you’re only excluding truly unengaged people.
Exclude inactive subscribers from your campaignsExclude inactive subscribers from your campaigns
Once you’ve identified your inactive push subscribers, exclude them from all future push campaigns. Learn how to exclude a segment from a campaign.
Should you exclude inactive subscribers from your push flows?
The short answer: sometimes. Depending on the types of flows you send, you may want to exclude push subscribers from receiving some notifications. Consider the type, purpose, and frequency of your flow push messages.
These flows may send frequently and frustrate an unengaged subscriber. Consider excluding unengaged push subscribers from:
- Browse abandonment flows
- Cross-sell and upsell flows
- Price-drop flows triggered by viewing a product
- Review requests
To exclude inactive push subscribers from an entire flow, add the same criteria used in your push segment as a flow filter. To exclude inactive push subscribers from a single message, add those criteria as an additional filter for that message.
These flows may be interesting even to unengaged subscribers. Don’t exclude inactive push subscribers from flows like:
- Order confirmation flows
- Back in stock alerts
- Transactional messages
Outcome
After completing the steps above (and continuing to exclude inactive subscribers from your push campaigns on an ongoing basis), you can be certain that unengaged push subscribers won’t become frustrated and delete your app. If a push subscriber later re-engages, they’ll be removed from your inactive segment and resume receiving push messages.
Additional resources