How can I avoid getting spam complaints?

If you send large mailing lists there is a chance you may receive spam complaints.

The bad news is that if we receive a significant number of complaints we may have to suspend and in certain circumstances cease your account. Accounts suspended or ceased do not receive any service credit or refund.

To help reduce the possibility of spam complaints here are some useful tips:

• Identify yourself at the start of the email and / or in the subject line and avoid spam like subject lines (i.e. Limited time offer!!).
• Ensure you only email genuine 'opt-in' email addresses - ideally only those you have generated yourself and where the customer has indicated they wish to receive emails from you.
• We do not recommend you 'buy' email lists as although these are sometimes sold as being 'opt in' (in our experience) they rarely are.
• Make sure you include unsubscribe / removal instructions, that they are clearly visible and importantly work - helping ensure that people are removed as quickly as possible.
• If possible, customize / personalize your emails - some mailing list software allows you to use fields to generate unique emails for each recipient - for example 'Dear [first-name]'.
• If you get 'bounces' (i.e. someone has changed their email address and now their email address does not exist) be sure to remove these from your mailing lists. Some ISP's count the number of emails sent to 'invalid' email addresses and include this in their anti-spam systems.
• When generating messages most mailing list software lets you generate a single email message 'per recipient' - this is far better than sending a single message with a number of recipients (usually all stated on the Bcc: line). Typically you will find single messages per recipient are less likely to be caught by spam filters and as they are 'To' the recipient are more likely to actually be read.
• If you have not emailed a recipient in a long time (years?) - carefully consider if you should as they may no longer want to receive emails from you or may not recognise you / your company. Sending this type of email may be much more likely to receive a 'spam' complaint.

The good news is that these recommendations will also help improve the response rates of your mail shots!

If you have any questions please contact us.

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