Email Deliverability Tips

Ensuring requested opt-in email is delivered to subscriber
inboxes is an increasingly difficult battle in the age of spam filtering. Open and
click thru response rates can be dramatically affected by as much as
20-30% due to incorrect spam filter classification.

Permission

Confirming that the people who ask for your information have
actually requested to be on your list is the number one step in the
battle for deliverability. You should be using a process called
confirmed opt-in or verified opt-in to send a unique link to the
attempted subscriber when they request information. Before adding the
person to your list they must click that unique link verifying that
they are indeed the same person that owns the email address and
requested to subscribe.

Subscriber Addresses

When requesting website visitors to opt-in ask for their
“real” or
“primary” email address instead of a free email
address like Yahoo or
Hotmail. Free emails tend to be throw away accounts and typically have
a shorter lifetime than a primary ISP address.

List Maintenance

Always promptly remove undeliverable addresses that bounce
when
sending email to them. An address that bounces with a permanent error
2-3 times in a 30 day period should be removed from the list.
ISP’s
track what percentage of your newsletters bounce and will block them if
you attempt to continually deliver messages to closed subscriber
mailboxes.

Message Format

Usage of HTML messages to allow for text formatting, multiple
columns, images, and brand recognition is growing in popularity and is
widely supported by most email client software. Most spam is also HTML
formatted and thus differentiating between requested email and spam
HTML messages can be difficult. A 2004 study by AWeber .com shows that
plain text messages are undeliverable 1.15% of the time and HTML only
messages were undeliverable 2.3%. If sending HTML it is important to
always send a plain text alternative message, also called text/HTML
multi-part mime format.

Content

Many ISP’s filter based on the content that appears
within the message text.

Website URL:

Research potential newsletter advertisers before allowing
them to
place ads in your newsletter issues. If they have used their website
URL to send spam, just having their URL appear in your newsletter could
cause the entire message to be filtered.

Words/phrases:

Choose your language carefully when crafting messages. Avoid
hot
button topics often found in spam such as medication, mortgages, making
money, and pornography. If you do need to use words that might be
filtered, don’t attempt to obfuscate words with extra
characters or odd
spelling, you’ll just make your messages appear more spam
like.

Images:

Avoid creating messages that are entirely images. Use images
sparingly, if at all. Commonly used open rate tracking technology uses
images to calculate opens. You may choose to disable open rate tracking
to avoid being filtered based on image content.

Attachments:

With viruses running rampant and spreading thru the usage of
malicious email attachments many users are wary of attached documents.
It’s often better to link to files via a website URL to
reduce
recipient fear of attachments and reduce the overall message size.

CAN-SPAM Compliance

The January 2004 Federal CAN-SPAM law introduced a number of
rules
regarding the delivery of email. It’s important you have your
legal
counsel review your practices and ensure you are in compliance. The two
most important rules include having a valid postal mail address listed
in all commercial messages and a working unsubscribe link that is
promptly honored to remove the subscriber from future messages.

Reputation

Reputation services are often used by large ISP’s as
a way to vet
email senders regarding their email practices and policies. Businesses
listed with these services are then given less stringent filtering or
no filtering at all. Several reputation services are:

• http://www.isipp.com/iadb.php
• http://www.bondedsender.com
• http://www.habeas.com

Relationships & Whitelisting

Contact with major ISP’s and email providers is
essential in letting
them know about your requested subscriber email. Many large providers
such as AOL and Yahoo have specific whitelisting programs and
postmaster website areas to ensure your email is delivered as long as
you meet their policies and procedures in handling your opt-in list.

Email
deliverability is
about ensuring requested opt-in email is delivered to the intended
recipient. While no single tip will enable you to get 100% of your
email delivered each one utilized as a group can go a long way to
reaching that goal.