Users are discussing the need for better tracking of email unsubscribes in Discourse, particularly for triggered emails sent from specific categories. rbrunson notes that while they can identify users who stopped watching a category via the Data Explorer plugin thanks to @pfaffman, they want to also track users who unsubscribe via the “Don’t send me any mail” link. sam acknowledges this is an interesting feature gap, and ToddZ expands on the need for unsubscribe date tracking, user activity context (e.g., trust level, last seen), and insight into what type of email triggered the unsubscribe. tobiaseigen formally moves the request to the #feature category. ToddZ shares a SQL query to approximate unsubscribe trends by filtering users with disabled email preferences, but notes it lacks key metadata like unsubscribe timestamps and email source context. The community agrees that a dedicated unsubscribe tracking report — including what email triggered it, whether it was digest or full unsubscribe, and user history — would be valuable for understanding user behavior and improving email strategy.
We send a triggered email via Discourse to all users when a new topic is posted by an admin in a specific section. I assume some users are unsubscribing from these triggered emails and/or changing their email preferences upon receiving the email.
Is there a way to track the number of unsubscribes?
You could use the data explorer plugin to search which users are not watching the category.
Good question, any thoughts here @sam?
Not at the moment but I think a report (and tracking) of where the atomic unsubscribe comes from is interesting
Hi again.
We were able to use the data explorer plugin to find the users who are no longer watching the category (thanks @pfaffman!). We would also like to find the users who unsubscribe by clicking on “To unsubscribe from these emails, click here” and then selecting “Don’t send me any mail from Squarespace Circle Forum”
Do you have any insight on the best way to query the results for the don’t send me any mail folks?
CC: @Emaddy
I couldn’t find more recent discussion of this…
I would also find a report & tracking of atomic unsubscribes interesting.
I do have the Data Explorer query to list digest-unsubscribed users. But:
This seems like a legit new feature request, if there really is no way to see which email addresses (and how many) are unsubscribing as a result of receiving emails from a Discourse site. I will slide this over to Contribute > Feature so it can be discussed.
I’ve expanded that query to kind of help with my point #2 – I can extrapolate and figure who were probably the most recent unsubscribers:
-- list users with negative email preferences and include their TL, touch dates, and Cheers
SELECT u.ID "User ID"
,u.USERNAME "Username"
,u.trust_level "TL"
-- the following line optionally includes the all-time Cheers score from the Gamifaction plugin. See second join below.
,di.gamification_score "Cheers"
,CAST (u.first_seen_at AS DATE) "Joined"
,CAST (u.last_seen_at AS DATE) "Seen"
,CAST (u.last_emailed_at AS DATE) "Mailed"
,CASE uo.email_digests
WHEN 't' THEN 'Yes'
WHEN 'f' THEN 'NO'
ELSE 'Not set'
END "Digests?"
,CASE uo.email_level
WHEN 0 THEN 'NEVER'
WHEN 1 THEN 'Away'
WHEN 2 THEN 'Always'
END "Email lev"
,CASE uo.email_messages_level
WHEN 0 THEN 'NEVER'
WHEN 1 THEN 'Away'
WHEN 2 THEN 'Always'
END "Email msg lev"
FROM USERS u
LEFT OUTER JOIN USER_OPTIONS uo
ON u.ID = uo.USER_ID
-- this second join includes the all-time Cheers score from the Gamifaction plugin
LEFT OUTER JOIN directory_items di
ON u.ID = di.USER_ID AND di.period_type = 1
-- use the following SELECT statement to list users receiving no Topic activity emails
WHERE uo.email_digests = 'f' OR (uo.email_level = 0)
-- or use the following SELECT statement to list users receiving no Topic activity emails AND no Message activity emails
-- WHERE uo.email_digests = 'f' OR (uo.email_level = 0 AND uo.email_messages_level = 0)
AND u.ID <> -1
ORDER BY u.last_emailed_at DESC
…but without some dates and details about unsubscribe requests, it can’t be a clear picture.
Basically what I’m looking for is: what kind of email prompted an unsubscribe; did they unsubscribe from the Digest or from everything; was an unsubscriber an active long-time user who perhaps lost interest, or were they an inactive TL0 who wasn’t really that interested to begin with?
