Subscribers and imports

Add and import subscribers, understand what each status means, and organise your list with tags and segments.

The Subscribers page is where you see everyone on your list, how your audience is growing, and how it behaves. It's under Audience > Subscribers.

The Subscribers page

At the top, choose a time range for the charts, and use Import subscribers to add people. The tabs are:

Growth, Engagement, Acquisition, Retention & LTV and List health: charts about your audience over the chosen time range.
Segments: how your segments compare.
Tags: create and manage subscriber tags.
People: the list itself. Search by email, filter by status, and filter by tier (Free tier or Any paid tier).

Click anyone in People to open their profile, with their activity, tags, automations, billing and referrals.

Subscriber statuses

Status	What it means	Gets your emails?
Subscribed	On your list and receiving your newsletter, unless they've paused your emails.	Yes, unless paused
Web reader	Can read your website but doesn't receive email.	No
Unconfirmed	Signed up but hasn't clicked the confirmation link yet. This happens when your publication asks new readers to confirm their email.	No
Awaiting approval	Asked to join your private publication and is waiting for you. Use Approve or Deny on their row.	No
Unsubscribed	Chose to stop receiving your emails, or was unsubscribed by you.	No
Bounced	Emails to this address couldn't be delivered.	No
Complained	Marked one of your emails as spam.	No

If you Deny an access request, the person isn't added. They can request access again later.

Adding and importing subscribers

Go to Settings > Subscribers Import (or click Import subscribers on the Subscribers page), then click New Subscriber Import. Under Historical Imports you can see every past import, with its Method, Status, Total, Succeeded, Failed and Date.

Import Method

CSV File: upload a .csv file of up to 5 MB. The whole file is scanned for email addresses, so it doesn't matter which column they're in. Other columns, such as names, are not imported.
Manual (paste emails): paste addresses separated by commas or new lines. Use this to add one person or a handful.

Before the import starts, you'll see how many addresses were queued and how many were skipped. For Manual, invalid addresses and duplicates are skipped. For a CSV File, duplicates are counted as skipped, and anything in the file that isn't an email address is simply ignored.

Advanced Configuration

Add to Automations: enroll the imported subscribers in the automations you pick. The automations must be published.
Apply Subscriber Tags: tag everyone in this import with the tags you pick.
Send Welcome Email: this switch is saved with the import, but imports don't send a welcome email at the moment. To greet imported subscribers, use Add to Automations with an automation that sends your welcome email.

Click Start Import. The import runs in the background and you'll get a notification when it's finished.

What an import does

Imported people are added as Subscribed straight away. They don't get a confirmation email, so only import people who have agreed to hear from you.
Imports don't start Sign Up or Email Submission automations. Use Add to Automations instead.
Addresses that are already on your list are left as they are and counted under Failed. This includes people who unsubscribed: importing them again does not subscribe them again.
Tags and automations are applied only to the people this import added.
If an import would take you past your plan's subscriber limit, the whole import is refused with "This plan is limited to ... subscribers. Upgrade your plan to continue growing."

Import statuses

Status	Meaning
Pending	Waiting to start.
In progress	Adding subscribers now.
Completed	Finished. Check Succeeded and Failed for the numbers.
Failed	No address in the import could be added.

Managing one subscriber

On a subscriber's profile, the actions menu has:

Unsubscribe: they stop receiving your emails.
Add to Automations: enroll them in one or more published automations.
Delete Subscriber: permanently removes them from this publication. This can't be undone.

You can also add or remove tags on their profile.

Segments

A segment is a group of subscribers. Use the segment bar at the top of the Subscribers page to view one, or click New segment to create one. There are three types:

Type	How membership works
Static	Built from your conditions when you create it. It is not updated afterwards.
Dynamic	Built from your conditions and updated automatically every day.
Manual	You upload or paste a list of subscribers. It is not updated automatically.

From the segment bar you can also Edit segment, Recalculate now, Pause segment or Resume segment, and Delete segment.

You can send a newsletter to segments by choosing Selective under Email audience when setting up the newsletter. Segments can also start an automation with the Segment Action trigger.

Your plan

Your plan sets how many subscribers you can have. When you reach it, new signups and imports are refused with "This plan is limited to ... subscribers. Upgrade your plan to continue growing."

Troubleshooting

My import shows lots of Failed rows. Those addresses were probably already on your list. Existing subscribers are never changed by an import.
Imported people didn't get a welcome email. Imports don't send one. Add them to an automation that sends it, using Add to Automations on the import or on each profile.
Someone isn't receiving my newsletter. Check their status. Only Subscribed people get your emails, and not while they've paused them from your preference centre. Unconfirmed people need to click the link in their confirmation email first.
A dynamic segment looks out of date. Dynamic segments update daily. Use Recalculate now to update it straight away, and check it isn't paused.
My CSV imported nothing. Make sure the file is a .csv under 5 MB and contains valid email addresses.

Subscribers and imports

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