What are telltale signs of over-mailing?

The telltale signs of over mailing appear in your engagement metrics and subscriber feedback. Rising unsubscribe rates are the most direct signal. If more people are leaving your list after each send, you are crossing the tolerance threshold. Increasing spam complaint rates are even more damaging because they directly harm your sender reputation.

Declining open and click rates over time indicate that your audience is tuning out. If your open rate drops from 25 percent to 15 percent over a few months without changes to content quality, frequency is likely the culprit. Engagement recency also reveals over mailing. If a growing percentage of your list has not interacted in weeks or months, you are sending to people who no longer care.

You might also notice deliverability degradation such as increased placement in the spam folder or throttling by mailbox providers. Survey feedback and support inquiries mentioning too many emails confirm what the data suggests. Over mailing is like ringing the ship's bell every hour through the night. Eventually, the crew stops listening and starts looking for a quieter vessel.