Types of Contacts

Learn the different types of contacts and the specific content they can receive.

Yasmine avatar
Written by Yasmine
Updated over a week ago

When you're building an email marketing list, it's important to understand the different types of contacts you can have. This will help you to manage your list effectively and send targeted messages that your subscribers will appreciate.

Here is a breakdown of the two main types of contacts:

1-Active Profiles

  • Subscribed contacts:

These are contacts who have explicitly opted in to receive your email marketing.

  • Non-subscribed contacts:

These contacts have not given explicit consent for marketing, but have not unsubscribed. They may have provided their email during checkout, cart abandonment, or account creation.

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2- Inactive Profiles

  • Unsubscribed contacts:

These are contacts who have previously subscribed to your email marketing but have since opted out. Contacts who have unsubscribed will not be able to receive any marketing campaigns.

  • Hard bounced contacts:

These emails have been returned to the sender due to a permanent error, such as an invalid email address.

  • Deleted

These are contacts that requested to delete all their information when they unsubscribed.

  • Complained

These are contacts who reported the campaigns as spam.

What types of content can be received by each contact category?

  • Subscribed contacts are eligible to receive all types of marketing campaigns.

  • Non-subscribed contacts can receive automations triggered by their behaviour in your store.

  • Unsubscribed contacts can't receive any marketing campaigns as they haven't opted in.

The following table presents email campaign types and corresponding contact statuses:

Embedding SmartrMail's Signup forms is the most effective approach for gathering opt-ins from your non-subscribed contacts.

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