 
by Kelly Rusk – Communications Manager
According to a recent study by EmailLabs, over 80 per cent of email marketers say deliverability is a major challenge for their organization. In the same study, only 10 per cent said they would make deliverability a priority for 2006.
Moral of the story: if you want an edge on your competition, make deliverability a priority. Think of the people out there who have eagerly opted in to receive information from you, and they aren’t getting it. What does that say for your brand?
Unfortunately efforts to prevent spam have spawned challenges for legitimate email marketers like hyperactive email filters and ISP blocking, which undoubtedly means false-positives are unavoidable. The good news is there are steps you can take to ensure your deliverability is as best as it can be.
- Permission-based opt-in lists only – Ok let’s face it: you don’t like spam, we don’t like spam, and nobody likes getting spam. If someone hasn’t explicitly requested for emails from your company, you’re sending spam – even if you aren’t trying to sell Viagra or other cheap pharmaceuticals.
- Goodbye role addresses- Role addresses – those emails that start with a generic word such as info@, news@, sales@, etc. – are automatically blocked by some email technology services, and therefore count as a bounce. Because multiple individuals usually monitor these addresses, it is unlikely that all of them gave permission to be included in your mailing list, and therefore they go against best practices. Also, we discourage the use of these addresses for “From” or “Reply” addresses as Spammers often like to use them.
- A clean list is a bounce-free list – Take the time to clean your list. Clear out hard bounces (non-existent email addresses) after each campaign. Monitor soft bounces and clear out any addresses that are consistently bouncing. If your email goes out with a high number of bounces, many ISPs will block your address and your bounce rate will go up even more.
- Make sure unsubscribers get unsubscribed – It is not uncommon for people to hit reply and ask to be unsubscribed without hitting the “unsubscribe” link. Make sure someone regularly checks the “reply to” account; you could also be missing valuable feedback and comments from subscribers!
- Email Authentication – A relatively new phenomenon, ISPs are adopting authentication to stop spammers who “spoof” legitimate email addresses. If you are using a reputable email technology service, you need not worry. More info on email authentication from Wikipedia
Following these best practices may take extra time, but you will see from increased results that it is well worth it. Remember: list quality is always more important than quantity. And of course, if you need help from the pros, you can always contact cardcommunications.
About cardcommunications:
As an innovative e-marketing outsource solution, cardcommunications
helps businesses deepen customer relationships, influence client
behaviour, build brand and boost revenue. These benefits are achieved
though a wide range of e-marketing programs including e-newsletters,
e-promotions, and e-surveys - all built through a combination of
permission-based strategies and best practices. Serving local and
national clients in government, education, high tech and retail
sectors, the reach of cardcommunications is broad. |
