What's the difference between a Subscriber and a Contact?

[drdjmoran]

I'm brand new here. I appreciate any help you can give. I uploaded 9 .xls spreadsheets of contacts that I received OUTSIDE of Constant Contact. On my account page called "Contacts," I see all 9 lists and the number of "Contacts" in each one. The sum of all of them = 1367. It took a lot of work to GAIN those people's interest AND to also enter it into the spreadsheet. The "Contacts" page indicates that I have 890 "Subscribed" - I really don't understand. Where did the other 447 people's emails go? When I export a spreadsheet, I have 890 people in the export... but I just don't understand why I don't have 1367. I highly doubt there were over 400 overlaps/ duplicates. I'm really struggling to understand what happened. Any help would be greatly appreciated, DJ

[drdjmoran]

Hi @DanielM04. A subscriber in this case would be a contact in your account. I reviewed your account and there are contacts who belong to multiple lists. This causes the number under "Lists" to be higher since it counts list memberships. When viewing "Contacts", this will show the actual number of contacts in your account.

[drdjmoran]

Hello @drdjmoran ,

1. I'd recommend checking out this post in our Community as a sort of nexus for general "getting started"-related guides, as well as our Community's Onboarding Hub.
2. If you've imported the contacts within the last 7 days, you can check your import/export activity to see why some contacts wouldn't have uploaded - reasons can be improperly entered email addresses that you can correct/ignore, missing email addresses, or duplicates. Our system wouldn't have anyway of telling if an uploaded contact is no longer valid until you've actually tried to send to them through us, so any that didn't upload wouldn't be considered bounces like non-existent yet.
3. If someone is unfamiliar with these kinds of systems, or even just unfamiliar with ours, they can have a lot of questions while getting started. That's why we have our Knowledge Base (also available within your account via the Help tab), and our support staff. When it comes to your particular situation, it's also not uncommon, as not every CRM or ESP keeps track of duplicates, and some do allow contacts without email addresses. Different systems will have different quirks and functionalities of even basic elements like contacts and email scheduling, so it's completely valid to have questions about how our system works. Asking these questions, and reading up on relevant help info before diving in too deep is highly recommended.

[Caitlin_M]

Hi @DanielM04. A subscriber in this case would be a contact in your account. I reviewed your account and there are contacts who belong to multiple lists. This causes the number under "Lists" to be higher since it counts list memberships. When viewing "Contacts", this will show the actual number of contacts in your account.

[drdjmoran]

Caitlin, 

Thank you! I have further questions about this topic.

1 - How do I learn more about CC?  The video library seems to provide a lot of information, but not deep information.  Is this a reasonable place for asking questions, or were you just nice to me because I'm a noob? :-). Someday, I'm going to be a B+ Constant Contact client... 

2 - I believe your answer because you have been an administrator for almost 8 years, but it's hard to believe that I once had 1367 contacts, but it only amassed to 890 subscribers.  How can I be SURE what happened to the other 447?  That is a lot of people that I can't 'advertise' to anymore.  What led to those 447 no longer being on my subscriber list?  I am guessing: a) duplicates, b) busted email addresses (ex. the person left that job and the email addy is no longer valid), c) mis-entered e-addresses.  It'd be neat if CC collected all the rejected... and then reported why.

3 - Is this a typical noob question?  Like, do lots of freshman using CC often ask, "What happened to my list!?"  Is this the nature of the beast, or did I just screw up?

[William_A]

Hello @drdjmoran ,

1. I'd recommend checking out this post in our Community as a sort of nexus for general "getting started"-related guides, as well as our Community's Onboarding Hub.
2. If you've imported the contacts within the last 7 days, you can check your import/export activity to see why some contacts wouldn't have uploaded - reasons can be improperly entered email addresses that you can correct/ignore, missing email addresses, or duplicates. Our system wouldn't have anyway of telling if an uploaded contact is no longer valid until you've actually tried to send to them through us, so any that didn't upload wouldn't be considered bounces like non-existent yet.
3. If someone is unfamiliar with these kinds of systems, or even just unfamiliar with ours, they can have a lot of questions while getting started. That's why we have our Knowledge Base (also available within your account via the Help tab), and our support staff. When it comes to your particular situation, it's also not uncommon, as not every CRM or ESP keeps track of duplicates, and some do allow contacts without email addresses. Different systems will have different quirks and functionalities of even basic elements like contacts and email scheduling, so it's completely valid to have questions about how our system works. Asking these questions, and reading up on relevant help info before diving in too deep is highly recommended.