Email reputation is currently buzzing all over the eMarketing landscape, in fact it have been for over two years.
Mediapost talks about five factors, or tricks as they are referred to, that cause your reputation to suffer. The problem is that many corporation’s use these techniques everyday and many believe that is an acceptable practise. Here are some ideas to prevent abusing these solutions yet still have the benefits:
~ Email is inexpensive and has huge returns (DMA $49 ROI for each 1$ spent) so it is abused by many, this has cause organizations like CAUCE and MAAWG to lead the initiative to end spam. Organic growth and proper ad placement will build a much more targeted and active subscriber base. For more ideas on list maintenance read “Keeping your lists clean“.
~ Before subscribing and assuming that your current users are interested in your new newsletters promote them via your existing communication channels and ask users to subscribe to your new publication. This is especially important if your new newsletter has different branding then their current subscriptions. Nothing damages reputation faster then a could dozen spam complaints against a new newsletter.
~ Over punctuation is very common in email. Remember your email etiquette – ALL CAPS is like shouting – Small fonts are hard to read and extra punctuation can distort your message. Remember the proper uses for punctuation like the question mark, exclamation mark and other punctuation.
~ Burying phrases in your privacy policy or user agreements that state users give permission to use their email for communications is another good way to damage your reputation. Think about this from the subscriber point of view, or even better ask from your mom’s point of view “Would mom realize that she is going to get email?”
Monitor your email with these services offered by Habeas or Return Path.
