Bouncing from campaign to campaign, contacts can pile up quickly! If you work with large campaigns, staying organized can feel tricky. Here are a few ways to clean up your contacts and keep your portal under control.

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Tip 1. Delete Unsubscribers and Spam Reports

It's a hard truth, but no matter how great your message is, not everyone wants to hear from you. Make a clean break by deleting contacts who’ve unsubscribed from your communications or marked your ThankViews as spam. 

To clear out these contacts:

1. Navigate to your Contacts page, a campaign’s Recipients list, or your Metrics page.
2. Click the Filter By dropdown above your table.
3. Deselect all but the Unsubscribed Email, Unsubscribed Phone, and Spam Report checkboxes. 
4. Unsubscribed contacts appear in gray italics, and a person icon with an X shows next to their name. Hover over this icon to see whether they unsubscribed from email or SMS.  
5. Click the bulk selection checkbox in the upper-left of your table header to select these contacts.
6. A red Delete button will appear above your table. Click this to remove them.

If you want, you can extend this sweep to include contacts with low engagement scores. In step 3, select the 1-star checkbox in your filter dropdown to include contacts who aren’t interacting with your communications. Delete these contacts if needed (just be sure to download their metrics first if you want to keep them!).

Note: You can also view which campaign a contact unsubscribed from and when by clicking into their profile. This helps you understand what triggered the unsubscribe and adjust your outreach strategy accordingly. If you see a status without additional campaign details, this means that the contact was removed from the associated campaign, or the campaign itself was deleted.

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Tip 2. Investigate and Update Bounced Contacts

It can be tempting to delete contacts that have bounced, as a bounce suggests that the email address may be invalid or the phone number incorrect. While deletion is an option, you can also keep your data clean by investigating these contacts and updating their details. 

To generate a list:

1. Navigate to your Contacts page, a campaign’s Recipients list, or your Metrics page.
2. Click the Filter By dropdown above your table.
3. Deselect all but the Bounced Email and Bounced Phone checkboxes. 
4. Bounced contacts appear in red text, and an alert icon shows next to their name. Hover the icon to see why they bounced and whether it was for an email or phone number.
5. Click the ellipses button above your table header and select Download .CSV. 

With this list in hand, compare contact details against your internal database or CRM. Remember to hover over a contact’s bounce icon (step 3 above!) in the Contacts page to quickly check the bounce reason, whether it’s an invalid phone number, hard bounce, email error, or something else. This helps you decide whether to update their information or remove them from your database. Depending on the reason, try reaching out to verify or update details, such as emailing to capture updated phone numbers (asking for cell numbers instead of landlines), or calling to check for email typos. 

To manage bounced contacts directly in ThankView: 

1. Take the same steps above to filter your contacts by Bounced Email and Bounced Phone. 
2. Click into an individual contact profile. You will see the bounce reason and a Remove Bounce button at the top of the profile.
3. Click Back in the upper-left of the profile to view which campaign triggered the bounce along with the date and time it occurred. This information, along with the bounce reason, helps you determine whether the bounce resulted from a typo, full inbox, invalid number, or another issue.    . 
4. After updating their contact details or confirming their accuracy, you can unbounce the contact directly from their profile. Click Edit Contact, then Remove Bounce to reset their bounce status without needing to contact our support team.

Note:

• The Remove Bounce button is only available if your organization has DNS/DKIM set up. If you don't have this configured, you'll still see the bounce reason but won't have the option to unbounce the contact. 
• In some contact profiles, you may see a bounce status without additional campaign details. This means that the contact was removed from the associated campaign, or the campaign itself was deleted.

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Tip 3. Keep Your Data Consistent 

Did you know we offer a spreadsheet template to help you align your data with the fields in your portal? We recommend using this document to keep your uploads clean and consistent, but creating your own template is cool too! The keyword here is consistency. Apply the same formatting for each spreadsheet to keep your contact data neat and cohesive. 

To access our template:

1. Navigate to your Campaigns page.
2. Select any campaign in your portal.
3. Navigate to the Recipients step and click the blue Add Recipients button above the table header.
4. Select the Upload tab if not already selected.
5. Near the top of this tab, click Download here next to “Need a CSV Template?”

Save this template for easy reference when formatting future spreadsheets.

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Tip 4. Utilize Lists as You Go

If you have segments you plan to send multiple campaigns to, using Lists is a no-brainer! Save yourself time (and avoid unnecessary spreadsheet uploads) by dropping these recipients into a List before you start building your campaign. Make sure you name your Lists using consistent naming conventions so you can easily identify their contents later! Check out our article on Creating and Using Lists. 

Tip 5. Download Metrics Before Deleting Contacts

You can delete contacts from your portal, but doing so will also delete their metrics. Always download metrics beforehand if you want to retain them. If you only need to delete a contact from a specific campaign, do this in the Recipients step of that campaign instead of on the Contacts page. This removes them from that single campaign and deletes their metrics for it, but preserves their other campaign metrics.

For mass deletion requests, reach out to your Customer Success Manager (CSM) or email success@thankview.com.

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If you have additional questions, please reach out to your Customer Success Representative or support@thankview.com.