5 Reasons Why Your Company Got Blacklisted
Written by Sue Walsh on September 30, 2011
Has your company ended up on a blacklist? If yes, here are some possible reasons why:
1. Your company didn’t respond to spam complaints lodged against it. Responsiveness counts! If your company is ignoring spam complaints or worse still, you don’t have a working abuse address for people to send complaints to, your chances of winding up on a black list are pretty good. When you don’t respond, it’s often assumed you are spammer-friendly. In this case, silence is not golden!
2. Your mail system is hosting an open relay. This is a huge no-no and almost guaranteed to get you blacklisted by many ISPs and other organizations. Block port 25 and make sure your system is locked down.
3. Your domain is hosting malware or a compromised website. It happens a lot more than you think and many times the affected website isn’t even aware of it until they get blacklisted or receive user complaints. If you have any unused FTP accounts, shut them down, and be sure to scan your site regularly. Not only could having a compromised domain or website get your blacklisted, but it can also get you buried by Google. There is no worse PR than getting a “this site could harm your computer” label slapped on your entry in Google’s search results.
4. You bought a bad mailing list. Mailing lists may seem like an attractive and cost-effective way to build a customer base but there are scammers out there selling lists full of email addresses that were harvested without the owners’ consent. If you buy one of these and start sending marketing emails, your company will soon find itself in hot water. It’s important to carefully vet a company before buying a mailing list from it, otherwise you may become an accidental spammer.
5. You spammed! Times are tough these days and the bleak economy looks like it is going to be here for awhile. This has lead to some companies making some pretty desperate moves such as spamming. Don’t do it. Follow the CAN-SPAM Act regulations to the letter. It’s not worth the risk!
Loading ...
Closing the open relay is the easiest fix here. I mean, if you’ve gone so far as to spam as a means to drum up business, your company needs to have a series of meeting about branding and marketing strategies and what have you, but just make sure you don’t have an open relay. It hardly takes any time at all, and it can wind up not costing your organization potential customers.
We should also include to this list those domain that share one IP address with several websites / domain names. This is because if one domain spams, there’s a great chance that all domains will also be blacklisted.
That’s why, if you have a website, get a dedicated IP address. Although it cost more, you’ll be assured especially if you’re planning to have an email marketing campaign. Think of it as an investment for the future.