5 Ways To Get Your Company On a Spam Blacklist
Written by Sue Walsh on June 27, 2011
Ending up on a blacklist is bad news. Your marketing emails will never get to the intended audience, and your reputation could be badly damaged. Worse still, if you wind up there due to bad marketing practices, your company could find itself in legal trouble for violating the CAN-SPAM Act. Here’s the five most common reasons companies may find themselves blacklisted.
1. Broken or non-existent abuse reporting addresses: It’s important to have an abuse@companydomain.com and/or a postmaster@companydomain.com address properly configured and working. This not only lets people alert you to any possible problems, but it lets ISPs and blacklist keepers get in touch with you to work things out.
2. Open relays or proxys: These are big no-nos and things spammers look for. Make sure your mail and proxy servers are closed and secured.
3. Badly formatted emails: If your mail server isn’t sending out messages that comply with RFC5322 standards, you may be flagged.
4. Buying email lists from unvetted resellers: Be very careful who you buy mailing lists from. It’s crucial to be sure the addresses were collected with the permission of the owners. Not all lists for sale used the opt-in method. Choose the wrong one and the flood of complaints your marketing emails may generate could get you blacklisted. The same goes for choosing third party emailers to do your marketing emails for you. Research and be sure the company doesn’t use spam techniques before you hand over your customer list!
5. Neglecting to keep your security software up to date and/or neglecting to actually use it: Scanning your system regularly to make sure there are no unwanted visitors using it is crucial. Having spambots or zombies detected on your system is a sure way to wind up blacklisted.
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Getting blacklisted can seriously damage day-to-day operations. The above methods aren’t just good for business, they’re good for people. Ultimately, most people I know do business with companies that treat them more like a customer to be won over than a sales statistic. Obviously in mass marketing this isn’t as possible, but showing the concern for your customer’s privacy is a big enough step for most.
Actually, any company that sends mass emails – legit or not – is a good candidate for blacklisting. The boundaries are so subtle that it’s not hard to cross them. I personally know of legit companies being blacklisted because of people wrongly flagging them.
For me, buying email lists, whether it’s from a reputable reseller or not, is a bad move. The best email and newsletter campaign is still through an opt-in system and not from purchased addresses.
By applying the opt-in system, your email messages will surely get to your intended readers. Not only that, subscribers (most of the time) will read your newsletter. This way, you’ll exert minimal effort with your marketing campaign and your company will not be blacklisted.