Maximizing Email Delivery with MaxDMS
We practice permission-based, opt-in email
marketing and enforce it with our clients and partners. Since
current spam filtering software erroneously blocks many legitimate
emails as well, we've taken several steps to ensure our clients
achieve the highest possible delivery rates.
Spam Filters - The Basics
The average email user will receive nearly 1,600 unsolicited
commercial email messages in 2006, leaving most ISP's and tech
departments scrambling to protect themselves. Most have added
filtering mechanisms to block unsolicited email or "spam."
The problem is that filters block not only spam, but also permission-based
email as well. According to recent research, the cost of spam
false positives can easily exceed $50 per user per year and
will cost U.S. Businesses about $3.5 billion in 2003 (the overall
cost of spam is now estimated at over $10 billion annually).
For this reason, it is now more important than ever to prevent
valid emails from being falsely labeled as spam.
As you can see from the diagram to the right, delivering even an opt-in email to a recipient's inbox can be a daunting task due to the number of points for potential failure or filtering.
How do ISP's and corporations decide whether an email is spam or not? There are four primary types of filters. MaxDMS provides a solution for each, as follows:
Filter Type 1: Content Filtering
Content filtering is used by anti-spam software systems employed
by a growing number of organizations. These systems, including
SpamAssassin, SpamKiller and others focus on the contents
of the email subject line and body content to determine whether
or not to deliver an email. This type of filter works on a
point scoring system, and each item in the subject line or
email body that "looks like" spam add to the spam score assigned
to the email. Content filters focus on promotional, phrases
such as "work from home", "guaranteed income", or even seemingly
innocuous phrases such as "click here" and "unsubscribe."
They also assign points to text formatting that is indicative
of spam, such as the use of ALL CAPITAL LETTERS, excess use
of bright colors, or very large fonts.
The MaxDMS Solution: Content Detective
MaxDMS leverages a proprietary system called the "Content
Detective" to help our clients ensure that their permission-based
emails avoid being erroneously labeled as spam due to
content filtering. This feature mirrors the logic used
by spam filtering software to identify words, phrases,
and patterns that are likely to trigger filters, then
recommends a resolution to each identified problem,
before an email is sent. Content Detective is included
free of charge with all of our products.
Filter Type 2: List Quality Filtering
Many spam lists contain a large number of bogus addresses
so spammers "bounce" a lot of emails with ISP's. To combat
this problem, many ISP's have added list quality filters to
detect when a large percentage of email addresses are bogus.
If the volume of bounces exceed a certain quantity, all other
emails may be disallowed (see "blacklisting" below).
The MaxDMS Solution: List Detective
We deploy "List Detective" to validate list
integrity and ensure that email is only sent to valid
addresses. List Detective scans each address as they
are uploaded to our system checking for known 'seed'
addresses that indicate a list may be non-permission
based. If they are found, the email addresses are not
uploaded and the MaxDMS Abuse Desk is notified. These
include known unsolicited addresses, planted addresses,
and addresses that don't belong to an individual, such
as nospam@, postmaster@ or abuse@.
List Hygiene - Designed to improve the integrity and performance of your email list, Return Path List Hygiene analyzes your email file using hundreds of proprietary algorithms to determine whether addresses are valid and mailable. Every list is checked for: format and syntax errors, invalid domains, common domain typos, bogus email addresses, and eNixies: email addresses that have been proven to be bad.
ECOA - Most lists shrink by 30% each year
due to users changing email addresses. Return Path
ECOA captures up to 10% of those bad address back each year.
How does it work?
- Consumers register their old and current e-mail addresses with Return Path through various points of presence on the Web (network partner sites, ISP's, top community sites, etc.).
- Return Path verifies the accuracy of the registered e-mail addresses by sending confirmation e-mails to the old and new e-mail addresses.
- Businesses using Return Path ECOA are notified when the consumer gives permission for their new e-mail address to be shared. When combined, list hygiene and ECOA allows our clients to retain 20% more of their addresses each year.
Filter Type 3: Volume Filtering
Since many spammers send bulk emails without regard to their
accuracy or volume, many ISP's filter using volume based filtering.
Volume filters focus on the number of simultaneous connections
that are opened at any one time with an ISP.
The MaxDMS Solution: Domain Monitoring
MaxDMS employs domain-level monitoring to manage the
number of connections opened for each ISP domain at
any one time. This ensures emails are delivered at a
maximum rate without triggering volume filters at large
ISP's such as AOL or Yahoo. Due to the large percentage
of users with major ISP's, domain monitoring is especially
critical for lists over 1 million addresses.
Filter Type 4: IP Address Filtering
Many organizations have employed IP address filtering to identify
IP addresses that send spam and disallow them into their system.
The technique of adding suspected IP addresses to a filtering
list is called "blacklisting." There are numerous active blacklists
in use today, some by private companies and individuals, and
others operated by anti-spam organizations. A related concept,
in which a list of "trusted senders" is used to determine
which email is legitimate, is called "whitelisting." White
lists are lists of IP addresses of organizations that are
trusted to deliver only legitimate, opt-in messages. Typically
an ISP will have several guidelines that a sender must follow
in order to qualify for the white list status, including email
formatting, name capture tactics, and client enforcement.
The MaxDMS Solution: Private IP & Monitoring
San Diego Media can host a unique IP address and domain for
each individual client. Clients selecting this option receive
an IP address which is registered within San Diego Media's
whitelist status, providing the client with better deliverability
than could be attained on one's own. Our abuse desk personnel
constantly work and monitor the individual IP's to ensure
full delivery of client emails.
The MaxDMS Solution: ISP Agreements
We have developed white list relationships with key ISP's,
anti-spam organizations, and others to ensure emails sent
via our system reach the intended audience. We are listed
on the "white list" for major ISP's, such as AOL, Juno, Yahoo,
Compuserve, NetZero, and others. Our white list status allows
mail sent from our system to be appropriately delivered to
their customers without the potential for filtering.
The MaxDMS Solution: Abuse Desk Management
One way to get in trouble with the anti-spam community is
to avoid responding to email complaints. Our abuse desk is
managed by a team of email delivery experts and we work on
behalf of our clients to respond to spam complaints received.
If necessary, we follow up with our clients to ensure appropriate
permission-based name capture policies and procedures are
in place. By knowing the efficacy of the name capture practices
employed by our clients, we will defend the validity of the
list and name capture practices to anti-spam organizations.
This ensures that companies following standard opt-in and
privacy guidelines can continue to experience optimal delivery
rates.
For more information please contact San Diego Media.
