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May
17
Why Are My Emails Going to the Spam Folder? How Subscriber Complaints Affect Inbox Placement.
Return Path Account Manager
Many people see email marketing as a one-way communication. Email marketers are sending emails to their recipients, who are then reading and/or deleting with no real dialogue back to the sender. However, it’s important to understand that it is a two-way street as subscribers do have various ways to communicate back to the sender via email activity (opens, clicks), spam complaints and trusted subscriber voting. And these communications from the recipients can negatively affect your inbox placement causing your emails to be delivered to the spam folder.
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Categories: Best Practices Explanation View Comments
May
16
Everything You Know About Email Content Filtering is Wrong
Consultant, Deliverability Consulting
You’ve spent hours developing what you think is the perfect email content. It looks great. It tells the story you intended. And that subject line? Genius! You’re sure it’s going to generate the ROI you want and hit the button to deploy the message to your subscribers. But wait…what happened? Why is your message being filtered as spam?
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Categories: Best Practices Commentary View Comments
May
11
New Alert Warns of Malware Downloads Through Hotel Internet
GM/Chief Security Officer
Earlier this week the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) released a new warning targeted towards travelers of the threat of malicious software injection on laptops through hotel internet connections. To me this was a little narrow and that we should broaden our thinking to include that general security and safe computing best practices should be observed when connecting to ANY wireless networks, not just hotel networks.
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May
7
A One-Way Ticket, 5,371 Miles and 3 Emails That Made a Difference
Senior Director, Response Consulting
As an email marketing consultant working with clients to improve the performance of their email programs, I have spent a lot of time helping brands change the practices that negatively impact their inbox placement and response rates. While this is both challenging and interesting work, it’s also refreshing to shift focus and appreciate some great practices that marketers are using to stand out from the “grey mail” and marketing clutter, target their subscribers using accurate data and provide relevant messaging that drives engagement.
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May
3
Mobile Email Optimization and What to Consider
Director, Response Consulting
Earlier this week Return Path released an infographic on mobile email viewership. The infographic is full of interesting stats so I thought we’d talk about what they mean for your email program. It’s clear that mobile email viewing is skyrocketing. Remember the saying “You only get one chance to make a first impression?” Well, that is the case with email on mobile. 88% of people check their email on a mobile phone daily. Wow. But, 63% of Americans and 41% of Europeans would either close or delete an email not optimized for mobile. And of all mobile openers, only 2% would open an email on both their phone and on a desktop. That’s a scary stat for anyone sending out email that doesn’t look good or work well on mobile. If your email is not optimized for mobile viewing, you are likely missing your chance to connect with and convert your subscribers and your segment of non-responders will start to grow. Here are some initial steps to take to optimize your program:
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Apr
30
Email Insider Summit Email Append Panel – The day’s hottest debate!
Director, Response Consulting
I had the pleasure of joining one of the most anticipated panel discussions during the Friday session of last week’s Email Insider Summit. The topic was “E-Append: Good, Bad, or Other?” and I was joined by Jordan Cohen (VP Business Development, Pontiflex), Andrew Kordek (Chief Strategist, Trendline Interactive), and Suzanne Shaughnessy (Sr Account Executive, Fresh Address). Eric Kirby (CEO, Connection Engine) moderated our spirited panel and started the discussion with a single question – “Is email append ok to do?” Jordan started by noting that the process lacks clear permissioning, and violates M3AAWG, ISP, and ESP policies. Andrew contested that if done well, the process could be a profitable acquisition method. This is my perspective on e-Append.
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Apr
25
Data Insights: Using Sender Reputation Data for Better Inbox Placement
Director, Professional Services
Sender Reputation Data (SRD) is a metric that is used by Microsoft in its proprietary spam filtering software called SmartScreen that determines if a message should be delivered to the inbox, spam folder or blocked. It consists of a panel of hundreds of thousands of users and these panelists are asked to determine if the filtering decision that Microsoft’s spam filter made was correct or not. This provides more accurate feedback since it’s nearly impossible for spammers to game this metric. Additionally, SRD minimizes the effect that subscriber complaints can have on one’s reputation and deliverability if subscribers are erroneously using the junk button, either marking an email as junk on accident or using the junk button to delete or unsubscribe from an email. In that sense, sender reputation data is not a complaint metric, but rather a feedback metric. In fact, at Return Path, we find the metric so useful that we also use it as part of our compliance efforts for Return Path Certification.
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Apr
24
New White Paper: Return Path and the Direct Marketing Association UK Highlight a Tidal Shift in Email Deliverability
Director, Professional Services, Response Consulting
The Direct Marketing Association (DMA) UK and Return Path, have launched a new White Paper uncovering the latest data and trends on email deliverability, produced collaboratively by the DMA Email Marketing Council, and with key inputs from Return Path’s own …
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Categories: Best Practices Commentary Research View Comments
Apr
5
Mass Market Mac Malware Has Arrived!
GM/Chief Security Officer
Do you use a Mac? Have you heard about the Flashback trojan? If you answered “yes” to the first question and “no” to the second, listen up! Even if you answered “yes” to both questions, listen up anyway! Do you …
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Mar
22
Using Sender Score to Avoid Being a Statistic
Director, Professional Services
If you’ve read the Global Deliverability Benchmark Report, you now know that it’s more difficult than ever to reach the inbox with more commercial email landing in the spam folder than ever before. If you’re not worried about your mails landing in the spam folder, you should be. As DJ Waldow from Waldow Social recently asked, how often do people really check their spam folders for mail they were expecting? In most case, it’s not often at all. If you’re not making it to the inbox, you’re not getting a response, an impression, or even a conversion. Simply put: you’re wasting your time and money. You don’t have to be the 1 in 4 statistic that never reaches the inbox. I’ll explain how you can determine the reasons you’re not reaching the inbox, so you know what to focus your time and efforts on.
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