| Emma | |
|---|---|
| Their stated threshold | Emma's guidance treats bounce rates above a few percent as a list quality problem and their team works with accounts to bring them down. |
| What happens if you cross it | Emma's support model is consultative and they work with organizations on list quality rather than suspending abruptly. Their customer base makes abrupt enforcement impractical. |
| Where the bounce data lives | Response, then the mailing, with the bounce breakdown. Audience, filtered by status, shows bounced and suppressed contacts across sub-accounts. |
| How bounces are classified | Emma suppresses hard-bounced addresses at the audience level, which applies across the sub-accounts sharing that audience. |
Bringing the rate down
Each step is an action inside Emma, in the order worth taking them.
Work out which sub-account sent to the failing addresses
In a university or multi-location account, several teams mail overlapping lists. The bounce belongs to whichever list brought the address in, not to whoever sent last.
Identify the age of the constituent data
Alumni and member lists are frequently a decade old. Work addresses in them have largely gone, and that is the dominant bounce source in this kind of account.
Separate personal from work addresses
A constituent's personal address survives a job change and their work address does not. Where you hold both, prefer the personal one for long-term contact.
Set a re-verification schedule
Annual for constituent data, more often for anything you mail regularly. A list that sits between annual appeals decays invisibly.
Coordinate suppression across departments
Audience-level suppression means one department's bad send removes the address for everyone. Agreeing a standard before sending avoids that argument afterwards.
The mistake people make here
A bounce report mixes two causes that need opposite responses: addresses that do not exist, and receivers refusing mail they could have delivered. The first is fixed by checking the list. The second is a sending problem and no amount of cleaning will move it.
Questions people ask
Why do alumni and member lists bounce so heavily?
Because work addresses die when people change jobs, and constituent records are frequently years old. A list captured at graduation is largely obsolete within five years.
Does a suppression in one Emma sub-account affect others?
Yes, where they share an audience. That is usually what you want and it means one department's send can remove a contact another department depends on.
How often should constituent data be re-verified?
At least annually, and before any major appeal. Lists that sit unused between campaigns decay without anyone seeing it happen.