The reader preference center

Between "everything" and "unsubscribe" there's a middle ground: let readers choose. Turn it on under your audience's Settings → Reader preference center and every email's footer gains an Email preferences link next to Unsubscribe, opening each reader's own page of checkboxes. Readers who want less mail get somewhere to say so—before they reach for the unsubscribe link, or worse, the spam button.

This setup page is topics only: lists readers join or leave. It does not omit people from a send except by leaving a topic. If a reader emails you, change their groups on the Groups page.

Topics—lists readers join or leave

A topic is a mailing group you put in readers' own hands: your blog list, ARC news, special announcements—even your main newsletter group itself, so readers can step out of the weekly email without leaving everything. Each topic shows as a checkbox, pre-checked when the reader is already in that group. Ticking joins the group; unticking leaves it.

For a group nobody should be able to join themselves—an ARC team, a street team, beta readers—tick Members only on that topic. Readers already in the group see the row and can untick it to stop those emails while keeping everything else; readers who aren't in it never see the row at all.

If your campaigns already go out to groups rather than the whole list, topics are a complete preference system: a reader who's only in your "New releases" group only ever gets new-release news.

Setting it up

1. Open the audience's Settings → Reader preference center.
2. Tick Offer the preference page.
3. Add each topic: a reader-facing label, the mailing group it maps to, and an optional short description. + New group… creates a group right in the dropdown. Tick Members only on invite-only groups.
4. Save.

Skip lists (email types that omit readers from every send of that type) are not on this setup page. Readers opt out by leaving a topic. If someone emails you, change that one reader on the Groups page.

The rules the page lives by

• No choice changes nothing. A reader who never opens the page keeps getting everything, exactly as today—all boxes ticked and never-visited are the same state.
• It's never a gate. The page appears in exactly two places: the footer link, and the unsubscribe page's "get fewer emails instead" offer. Signup never asks.
• Welcome sequences still run. Automations aren't filtered by preference choices—a reader who joins your ARC team gets the ARC welcome emails even after leaving the weekly topic. (Automated emails carry the preferences link in their footers too.)
• Only named groups are touched. Saving joins or leaves exactly the groups your settings name—nothing else about the reader changes.
• All the way off stays one click. The page links Unsubscribe too, so a reader who means "stop everything" is never trapped in checkboxes.

Linking it in your own words

The footer link is automatic. To invite readers yourself—"tell me what you'd like to hear about"—select some words in the composer, click Link, and use {{preferencesUrl}} as the address: it becomes each reader's own page at send time. And if you write your own footer with {{unsubscribeUrl}}, the automatic footer stands aside—include {{preferencesUrl}} yourself if you want the link there.