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Campaign Types

Offboarding Email

Emails sent after a customer has cancelled, designed to maintain the relationship and enable future return.

Definition

Offboarding emails are the messages sent after cancellation is confirmed and the customer has left. Unlike cancellation emails which try to prevent churn, offboarding emails accept the departure and focus on leaving a positive final impression, providing useful information about data export or account closure, and keeping the door open for future return.

Why It Matters

How you treat departing customers affects whether they ever return and what they tell others about you. A bitter exit experience generates negative word of mouth. A graceful offboarding can turn churned customers into future returnees or even referral sources. Some of your best customers will be people who left and came back.

How It Works

After cancellation is complete, send a confirmation email with details about when access ends, how to export data, and what happens to their account. Follow up with a thank-you message that invites them back when circumstances change. Some companies send periodic win-back emails to churned users over the following months.

Best Practices

  • 1Confirm exactly when access ends and what they lose
  • 2Provide clear data export instructions if applicable
  • 3Thank them genuinely without being sarcastic or passive-aggressive
  • 4Explain how to reactivate if they change their mind
  • 5Keep them on a low-frequency win-back email list (with permission)
  • 6Do not immediately hard-sell in offboarding emails
  • 7Survey a subset for detailed exit interviews

Win-Back Sequences

Build offboarding flows that maintain relationships with churned customers and automatically send win-back campaigns at the right intervals.

Learn More

Frequently Asked Questions

Cancellation emails fire when someone initiates cancellation and try to prevent it. Offboarding emails fire after cancellation is confirmed and focus on a graceful exit. Think of cancellation as retention and offboarding as relationship maintenance for potential future customers.

Yes, but carefully. Keep them on a separate list with low frequency. Occasional updates about major improvements or features might bring them back. Aggressive win-back campaigns annoy people. Respect unsubscribes immediately.

Wait at least 30 days before the first win-back email. People need time to miss your product or have their circumstances change. A typical sequence might be one email at 30 days, another at 90 days, and a final one at 6 months.