Too many promo emails after an order: what can you do?

After you place an order, you usually end up with more email than you bargained for: a welcome series, a request to leave a review, and then just regular promotions. That's almost never something you chose on purpose. It's just how the store set up its system. Below are the five most common reasons, and a quick test for each one so you can check which situation applies to you in a couple of minutes, instead of clicking some unsubscribe button and hoping for the best.

1. The checkbox was already checked at checkout

Most online stores check the newsletter signup box by default during checkout. You have to uncheck it yourself, and when you're rushing through an order, it's easy to miss. From that point on, you're on the mailing list, even though you never really chose to be.

Try this: pull up the order confirmation you got at the time and look for a line like "you'll now also receive our newsletter." Is it there? Then that's exactly what happened to you.

What to do about it: every promotional email has an unsubscribe link at the bottom. Click it and within a few days the emails should stop. Check your spam folder afterward too, since the unsubscribe confirmation sometimes ends up there by mistake.

2. You're in a standard welcome series after your first order

After a first order, a lot of stores automatically kick off a series of emails: a thank you, tips on your product, a check-in asking if everything arrived okay, and a few days later an offer for your next purchase. This happens to every new customer. It's not about you specifically.

Try this: count how many emails you got in the two weeks since your order and see if they land on a set schedule, like day 1, day 3 and day 7. If they match that rhythm, you're in one of these automated series, not just getting random emails.

What to do about it: these series usually stop all at once as soon as you unsubscribe from marketing, since they fall under the same opt-out. If it takes a few more days to fully go quiet after you unsubscribe, that's normal. The last email in line was often already queued to send. Some stores build these series on purpose to run two to three weeks, because their data shows new customers are more likely to place a second order during that window. That's why it sometimes takes longer than you'd expect for things to settle down.

3. Unsubscribing stops the newsletter, but not the review request

A lot of systems keep marketing and service emails strictly separate. Unsubscribe from the newsletter and the promotions disappear, but the automatic request to leave a review can keep showing up anyway. That feels unfair, since to you it's all just promotional email. The system doesn't see it that way.

"Monavida should send me fewer promotional emails."

Try this: look at the subject line of the email you keep getting despite unsubscribing. Does it say "review," "how's your order working out" or "share your experience"? Then that email belongs to a different category than the newsletter you unsubscribed from.

What to do about it: just reach out to customer service directly and ask them to pull your email address from the review series too. At a store that has its systems in order, that's handled in a couple of clicks. If you get a response that doesn't seem to address your question at all, check out how to spot an AI-generated reply. It also helps to spell out in your message that you're talking about a review request, not the newsletter, so customer service knows right away which system to check.

4. You have an account, and that account is separate from your order

If you ordered with an account instead of as a guest, your email address is usually tied to that account, not just that one order. A lot of communication preferences live in your account settings, separate from the unsubscribe link at the bottom of an email.

Try this: log into your account on the store's site and look for "communication preferences" or "my info." Is there a separate checkbox for email marketing still switched on, even though you already unsubscribed through an email link? That's your answer.

What to do about it: uncheck that box in your account directly. If you can't find it, just delete your account entirely and order as a guest next time. That way your email address doesn't automatically get tied to any subscription. Keep in mind that deleting an account can take a few days, since a staff member usually has to confirm it by hand before your info is actually removed from the system.

5. You've left your email address in more than one place

A discount code through a pop-up, registering a return, a question to customer service: anywhere you type in your email address, the system can treat that as its own separate signup. So you end up subscribed more than once without realizing it.

Try this: think back over the past few months to how many times you've entered your email with this store outside of your actual order, say for a discount code or a contact form. Each one of those moments could have been its own signup.

What to do about it: unsubscribe again each time a new round of emails starts up, and try to stick to the same email address so your unsubscribes stay grouped together. If you do use different addresses, like a separate one just for discount codes, keep track of which address is signed up where. That way you won't keep getting surprised by email on an address you forgot you ever gave out.

So why order at all, with all that email?

Most women who order from us aren't doing it because they're hoping for more email in their inbox. They just want to get rid of a problem. In our own survey of almost 2,900 customers, 32.8% named the underwire as their biggest complaint, and 23.3% said it pokes, digs in or cuts. That's a physical complaint, not a matter of looks.

So it makes sense you're not exactly waiting around for a string of promotional emails when all you wanted was a bra that actually feels good. That's why it matters that you stay in control of what lands in your inbox, separate from the product you ended up ordering. A store that has its act together understands that difference and makes it easy to get only the email you actually want, without making you click through ten different settings first.

What if you already unsubscribed and the email shows up again?

Sometimes an email slips through after you unsubscribe, simply because it was already queued to send before your unsubscribe went through. Give it a few days before you assume it didn't work.

• Check that the email is really coming from the same address you unsubscribed from.
• See if it falls under a different category, like a review request instead of a newsletter.
• Contact customer service if things still haven't gone quiet after a week.
• Only mark it as spam as a last resort, since that way you'd also miss important emails about your order or return.

Want to check whether a store actually has its systems in order before you order from them again? This article covers what to look for. That way you'll know upfront whether you're about to land in the same situation again, or whether the store in question has its email preferences sorted out by category.