# Step 3 - List Hygiene Review {% stepper %} {% step %} ### **💡** Goals * Understand the importance of good list hygiene * Implement best practices to be compliant with Batch's guidelines, sender's guidelines, and local legislation * Review and improve the quality of your recipients base * Identify the recipients categories you should exclude from the warmup phase and most of your campaigns/automations {% endstep %} {% step %} ### 📌 **Deliverables** Userbase review table {% endstep %} {% endstepper %} Once you have evaluated your current email performance, you can start qualifying users that will be addressed first during the email warmup phase. The subscribers qualification can be done in three steps: 1. **List hygiene policy**: Be sure you are already following the best practices to have as few bounces as possible. 2. **Subscribers categorization**: Group recipients per subscription source, to ensure you are sending the right message to the right audience and reduce the chance of getting negative feedback. 3. **Engagement-based qualification**: Qualify recipients based on their last engagement. ## List Hygiene Policy Review The first thing to do consists in reviewing your current list hygiene policy. Migrating from one email solution to another is a great opportunity to **start fresh and clean your list**. This is an important task to be sure your practices **match today's mailbox providers' guidelines**, legal requirements, and Batch guidelines. Please take some time to review your list hygiene policy and apply changes when needed: {% content-ref url="/pages/ESFsUdgH1O2GLlffLFw1" %} [Best Practices on List Hygiene and Recipients Collection](/guides-and-best-practices/email-deliverability/list-hygiene-and-recipients-management/best-practices-on-list-hygiene-and-recipients-collection.md) {% endcontent-ref %} ## Subscribers Qualification ### → Recipients Categorization Leads, signed up users, and newsletter subscribers **should not be treated the same way** and receive the same message. In the context of a warm-up, this can result in unexpected high levels of unsubscribes, bounces, and spam complaints you need to avoid. Make sure you can **clearly identify the subscription source** of each one of your recipients, to address them with the right message:
### → Engagement-based Qualification **Focus on quality over quantity** and dedicate your first emails to the most engaged of your users. Then, gradually increase the volumes of sent emails and **extend your messages to other segments** of users when the risks are lower for your newly created reputation.
During a warm-up phase, and even after, inactive recipients should not be part of your "normal" audience if you send newsletters. Dedicate a special reengagement program for them and let them go if needed. {% hint style="warning" %} Less engaged segments should be added to the batches of recipients in chunks of 15% of your existing volume. This is important to avoid tipping your reputation from good to bad. {% endhint %} ## Run Your First Diagnostic Once you've evaluated your list hygiene policy, applied required changes & identified segments for targeting, use this table to **visualize your recipient base** and **determine a "healthy" subscriber count**. This table should help you identify the segments you should exclude from the warmup and from most of your usual campaigns/automations.
📌 Recipients base review table | Segment | Leads | Newsletter subscribers | Service users | ALL SEGMENTS | | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ----- | ---------------------- | ------------- | ------------ | | **New** | | | | | | Opt-in | | | | | | Opt-in + opt-out | | | | | | **Engaged** | | | | | | Opt-in | | | | | | Opt-in + opt-out | | | | | |

Less engaged

(Last open

<3 months)

| | | | | | Opt-in | | | | | | Opt-in + opt-out | | | | | |

Inactive

(Last open > 3 months)

| | | | | | Opt-in | | | | | | Opt-in + opt-out | | | | | | **TOTAL** | | | | | | Opt-in | | | | | | Opt-in + opt-out | | | | |
## Next step Now you have reviewed your list hygiene rules and qualified your recipients base, let's take time to define a warm-up goal per subdomain:
{% content-ref url="/pages/GWhVPQvLFhb0jOvF3AAM" %} [Step 4 - Estimate Your Warmup Target](/guides-and-best-practices/email-deliverability/domain-and-ip-warm-up/step-4-estimate-your-warmup-target.md) {% endcontent-ref %} --- # Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question. Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter: ``` GET https://doc.batch.com/guides-and-best-practices/email-deliverability/domain-and-ip-warm-up/step-3-list-hygiene-review.md?ask= ``` The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language. The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation. Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.