Black Friday and Cyber Monday will be here before you know it. And if you wait until November to get your list ready, it’ll be too late.

That’s because platforms like Gmail, Yahoo and Outlook look at your sender reputation to determine if you’ll land in the inbox or the spam folder. If your emails aren’t landing in the inbox today, they won’t magically get there when your big sale goes live. It takes time to build trust and improve your sender reputation—and the work starts now.

Why sender reputation matters

Think of sender reputation like a credit score for your emails. Inbox providers are watching how your subscribers interact with your emails: Do people open them? Do they click? Or do they ignore them—or worse, mark them as spam?

Every positive interaction you earn makes your reputation stronger.  But it doesn’t happen overnight—it takes a few weeks of consistent, engaged sending. That’s why now is the perfect time to start.

The impact of unengaged subscribers

Not every subscriber on your list is helping your business. In fact, repeatedly sending to subscribers who don’t open your emails can actually work against you.

Here’s why: Inbox providers like Gmail and Outlook are always paying attention to engagement. If they see that a large percentage of your subscribers never open, click, or interact with your content, they assume your emails aren’t valuable. Over time, this damages your sender reputation—and that can make it harder for even your most loyal, engaged subscribers to see your emails.

In other words, sending to unengaged subscribers doesn’t just waste effort; it can keep your biggest fans from getting the content they signed up for.

That’s why it’s so important to regularly clean your list and remove or unsubscribe those unengaged subscribers. We recommend making this a habit every 3–6 months, so your list stays healthy and engagement rates stay strong.

Should I delete, unsubscribe or segment these subscribers?
This comes down to personal preference. Let’s break down the differences:

  • Deleting subscribers fully removes a subscriber and their historical information from Flodesk. This keeps your Flodesk account pristine, however, when you delete a subscriber, you will lose access to information like what segments they were in, when and how they opted in, etc. A deleted subscriber can easily rejoin your list via an integration, CSV upload, or by filling out a Flodesk form. 
  • Unsubscribing subscribers will keep all historical information in Flodesk, but will prevent them from receiving any further marketing communication from your Flodesk account. Unlike deleted subscribers, unsubscribed subscribers can only be re-added to your email list by filling out a Flodesk form again.
  • You can also choose to segment your subscribers into a list called “cold subscribers” and exclude them from your email sends—without removing them from your account. Some members choose this method so they can attempt to re-engage these subscribers before removing them from their list entirely. 

💡 Tip: With Black Friday right around the corner, proceed with caution if you choose to run a re-engagement campaign. They often go unopened, which can drag down your engagement at the exact moment you need it to be strongest. 

How to clean your list in Flodesk:

  1. Head to your Audience tab and click “Filter”
  2. Click “Add filter,” and choose “Last activity”
  3. Select “Is not” and then choose a date range: “In the last year”, “In the last 6  months” or “In the last 90 days” 
  4. Click “Apply” to see who fits this criteria, then click the checkbox at the top of the list to select those subscribers
  5. Either unsubscribe, delete, or move the selected subscribers to a new segment that you can exclude from future sends

Ready to dive in?

Log in and start cleaning your list

Build trust by warming your list

Inbox providers are always watching for sudden spikes in sending behavior. Sending one big email blast can backfire if you:

  • Haven’t been emailing regularly
  • Recently authenticated your domain
  • Plan to increase your sending volume
  • Just imported a brand-new list

If you go from sending nothing to sending thousands of emails overnight, it can look suspicious. That means your emails are more likely to land in the spam folder—even for your loyal subscribers who want to hear from you.

Warming your list solves this by gradually building trust. By starting with your most engaged subscribers first, you’re showing inbox providers that your emails are wanted, opened, and clicked. That positive engagement strengthens your sender reputation, making it easier for all your subscribers to see your emails when it really counts.

How to warm your list in Flodesk:

The best way to warm your list is to start with your most engaged segments and gradually expand to larger segments. 

  1. Create an email that can be sent over the course of a few weeks. Ask a question, offer a new freebie or resource, or give your audience a behind-thescenes update. No matter what you choose, make sure it’s something they’ll likely engage with, and that you can send over the next few weeks to each of your warming segments.
  2. Create your warming segments. You can do this a number of ways, like with audience filters, or by importing from a CSV (see a tutorial on that here). You want to start with a small number of your most engaged subscribers (50ish) and work your way up: 150, 400, 900, until all engaged subscribers are in a segment.
  3. Send the email to the first segment. These are your 50 biggest fans, so you should see some great engagement metrics from this one! Monitor it for a few days, and then move on to step 4.
  4. If all looks great, schedule the next emails. Space them out a few days apart so you can see how they perform and pause future sends if needed. 
  5. Closely monitor these emails as you send them. Make sure you’re seeing healthy engagement rates—this is what signals trust to inbox providers as you increase your sending volume. If you see a sudden drop or unusually low metrics, Pause future sends to prevent any damage to your sender reputation, then start again from step 1 and consider making your warming segments smaller, or removing less engaged subscribers.
  6. Once warming is complete, send to your subscribers consistently! Consistency is key—sporadic sending makes it harder to build and maintain a positive sender reputation.

💡 Tip: Don’t rush the process. It can take a few weeks to fully warm your list, but the payoff is worth it—your subscribers are more likely to see your Black Friday campaigns land right in their inbox.

The payoff

Cleaning and warming your list isn’t glamorous, but it’s the secret to Black Friday success. Do the work now, and by the time your big holiday campaigns go live, inbox providers will see you as a trusted sender. That means more of your subscribers will actually see your emails—and you’ll get the opens, clicks, and sales you’ve been working toward.

Don’t wait. Every send between now and November strengthens your reputation.

Head to your Audience tab in Flodesk and start building those engagement-based segments.

Get ready for Black Friday

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About the author

Dawn Richardson