The "responsible" decision that nearly destroyed a publisher's business

A few months ago, I was brought in to help a daily newsletter publisher who was confused about why their revenue had suddenly cratered.

"Chris, we made one small change three months ago. Everything looked fine. Then last month, revenue dropped 35%. What happened?"

I pulled up their data and saw exactly what happened.

They made a decision that seemed responsible at the time. It got approved in a leadership meeting. Advertisers were happy. Internal pressure eased.

And it nearly destroyed the business.

Here's the scariest part: For the first 60 days, it looked like it was working.

Three months earlier, this publisher was dealing with a familiar problem:

So they made what felt like a responsible call:

They expanded their base sending segment.

Specifically:

On paper, it made sense.

More reach → more opens → more clicks → more revenue.

The decision got nodded through. No one objected. It felt like smart growth.

For the first month, everything looked great.

No bounces. No blacklists. No obvious warnings.

Deliverability dashboards still showed "okay."

The decision was quietly labeled a win.

Leadership moved on to other priorities.

The team celebrated hitting their volume targets.

Nobody was watching what was happening behind the scenes.

While they were celebrating, inbox providers were recalculating trust.

That expanded segment included:

Nothing dramatic happened.

Signals just got worse.

But because nothing bounced and nothing screamed "error," no one reacted.

The team kept sending. The numbers looked stable. Everything seemed fine.

This is where the pain started.

Gmail opens dropped first. Then Yahoo engagement softened. Revenue per thousand sends fell, even as volume stayed high.

So they did what most teams do next:

They sent more to compensate.

That's when the domain reputation tipped.

Within weeks:

The short-term "fix" had turned into a long-term crisis.

By the time I got the call, they'd tanked their reputation, and would take months to recover.

Here's what makes this type of mistake so insidious:

Inbox providers don't react instantly. They watch patterns.

And once you teach them: "This sender keeps mailing people who don't want their email"

You don't get to undo that lesson quickly.

The damage wasn't caused by one bad send.

It was caused by 90 days of small, reasonable decisions compounding.

Each day, they sent to people who weren't engaging. Each day, inbox providers adjusted their trust score down a little bit. Each day, the problem got worse, invisibly.

By the time the numbers showed it, the damage was already done.

When I showed them what happened, the room got quiet.

Because undoing the problem meant:

That's a hard conversation.

The VP of Revenue didn't want to tell advertisers they were cutting volume.

The growth team didn't want to admit the expansion backfired.

The CEO didn't want to explain to the board why revenue would drop further before it recovered.

But the alternative was worse: Keep doing what wasn't working and watch the business slowly collapse.

Hard decisions:

Step 1: Immediately cut the expanded segment (dropped send volume by 35%)

Step 2: Return to only highly engaged subscribers (10-day openers + 30-day clickers)

Step 3: Implemented a proper re-engagement strategy for the mid-tier segment (not blasting them daily)

Step 4: Monitored Gmail and Yahoo separately to watch reputation recovery

Step 5: Slowly expanded volume again, but only when inbox placement recovered

The first 30 days were brutal. Revenue dropped further before it stabilized.

But within 90 days:

They made more money by sending to fewer people.

This wasn't about growth being bad.

It was about expanding before the system could support it.

The decision didn't fail immediately… it failed on a delay.

And by the time the cost was visible, the damage was already done.

Some decisions don't hurt because they're wrong.

They hurt because they work just long enough to hide the consequences.

Before you add more subscribers to your sending segment, ask:

✅ Are these people actually engaging with our content?
✅ When was the last time they opened or clicked?
✅ What's our current inbox placement with our engaged segment?
✅ Can our sender reputation support more volume right now?
✅ Are we expanding because it's smart, or because we're under pressure?

If your answer to falling performance is "add more volume," you're probably borrowing against deliverability you haven't lost yet.

I'm opening up 5 Free Deliverability Audit calls this week.

We'll look at your sending segments, engagement patterns, inbox placement trends, and sender reputation—and I'll tell you if you're sitting on a time bomb before it detonates.

Reply with "AUDIT" and I'll send you the private booking link.

(If you've recently expanded your sending segment to boost volume, or revenue is flat even though sends are up, you need this call.)

To making the right decisions,

Chris Miquel

PS: That publisher who nearly broke their business? They're now at 450K engaged subscribers (down from 620K total) and making more money than before. Turns out, sending to people who actually want your emails is a better business model than blasting everyone and hoping for the best.

BEFORE YOU GO