6 Ways To Avoid Your Emails Landing In Spam Box
Author: n.paul
Published in: Information Technology
Now-a-days emails are an integrated part of our daily lives. From e-commerce to doctor’s appointment, most of your important notifications are received via emails. The importance increases by tenfold when you own a company and have customers to tend to.
Emails are undoubtedly one of the most convenient, affordable and easiest marketing weapons that are proved to be effective and efficient. However, according to studies it is next to impossible to achieve a 100% inbox placement of when you are dealing with marketing or transactional mails. The average IPR rate stays within the limit of 89% regardless of the industries.
Now, most of the small businesses don’t even get to achieve that 89% of inbox placement as well. There is always something that’s being done wrong and need to be fixed for achieving a higher IPR rate. In this article, we are going to unfold 6 ways of avoiding your emails ending up in spam box.
But first let’s learn about how spam filters work.
What is spam filter and how does it work
Spam filters are a bunch of tools, which are often implemented by the email service providers. Spam filters assign spam score to an email and if the score meets a specific threshold, then it’s placed in inbox, otherwise the emails are sent directly to the spam folder. Spam filters are updated and modified every single day and the filter practices mostly stay undisclosed for security purposes. However, there are a general idea of what’s getting your emails in the spam box, so let’s go through the types of spam filter quickly.
There are six types of spam filters that work against spammy mails. The list of these spam filters is presented below:
- Blacklist filters: This type of spam filter checks whether the sender of the email is listed in any blacklist or not. If the sender is specified in any blacklist, then the mail will be sent to the spam boxes.
- Permission filters: this filter checks whether the sender has all the necessary permissions to send marketing mails. Make sure your domain has permissions to send marketing emails before starting a marketing campaign.
- Header filters: this filter checks if the header of an incoming email has falsified or infectious information.
- Content filters: as per the name suggests, this filter checks the content of an email. If the email contains trigger words, refined HTML code and malicious attachments, it’s sent directly to the spam folder.
- Rule-based or heuristic filters: These filters check if the incoming email fulfills all the criteria defined by the user. For example, if the user has blocked emails that contains the word ‘sale’, then each and every email containing the same word would be sent to the spam folder.
- Challenge-response filters: These are a simpler version of the filters. Challenge response filters challenge the sender with puzzles and questions to verify their legitimacy.
Apart from these basic filters there are two implementation-based spam filters as well, which are:
Gateway filters:
Gateway filters are often implemented as a physical sever and the primary work of the filter is to detect phishing, malware, viruses, spoofing and spam emails. These filters thoroughly analyze incoming emails and determine whether those are spam or not.
Hosted filters:
Hosted filters act like a second layer of security. These filters check the incoming emails once those are approved by gateway filter. These also work in assigning a spam score to emails.
4 ways of saving your emails from ending up in spam boxes
Now that we know what spam filters are and how do those work, let’s dive into the unknown territory of spam boxes. Here, we are going to discuss 6 ways of avoiding spam boxes. So, without any more delays, let’s dive in.
1. Know the email service providers and their practices
There are thousand different email providers and email clients but the industry is certainly dominated by only a few, and most of those have similar set of rules and practices. In the following section we are presenting a few of those email providers and their best practices:
Gmail:
- Configuring DKIM and SPF records are a must, so is setting up reverse DNS records and PTR records.
- Sending domain must be of same name as the public website.
- It’s better to send the emails from the same IP address.
- Sending same types of emails from same email IDs are mandatory too. For example: your promotional emails should be sent via sales@example.com and your transactional emails should be sent from info@example.com.
- Do not mix up email content. If you are sending a transactional mail then avoid placing promotional content.
- Do not impersonate anyone to gain recipients’ attention
- Not sending test messages from your main domain is also an important practice to keep under consideration.
Microsoft 365, Microsoft Outlook, Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail and AOL:
Microsoft 365, Outlook, Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail and AOL don’t have a clear set of rules or practices unlike Gmail. The users can define their own rules but there’s no set practices for the senders. Hence, it’s always better to abide by the general practices to avoid getting into trouble of spam boxes.
2. Manage a clean sender reputation
Maintaining a clean sender reputation is paramount for bulk email senders aiming to bypass spam filters. A strong reputation signifies trustworthiness to Internet Service Providers (ISPs), influencing email deliverability. Several strategies contribute to this vital goal.
First, authentication is critical. Implement SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records. SPF verifies the sender's IP address, DKIM confirms message integrity, and DMARC provides instructions for handling failed authentication. These protocols demonstrate legitimacy and reduce the likelihood of spoofing, which is a common tactic used by spammers.
Second, list hygiene is essential. Regularly prune inactive subscribers and remove bounced addresses. Sending emails to engaged recipients improves engagement metrics, signalling to ISPs that your content is valuable. Use double opt-in to ensure subscribers genuinely want your emails.
Third, consistent sending volume and frequency are crucial. Sudden spikes in email volume or erratic sending patterns can trigger spam filters. Gradually scale up email volume and maintain a consistent schedule to establish a predictable sending history.
Fourth, content quality matters. Avoid spam triggers like excessive use of capital letters, exclamation points, or misleading subject lines. Ensure your content is relevant, valuable, and personalized. Provide a clear unsubscribe link and honour unsubscribe requests promptly.
Fifth, monitor your sender reputation using tools like Google Postmaster Tools and Sender Score. These tools provide insights into your IP reputation, spam complaints, and delivery issues, allowing you to identify and address problems proactively.
Finally, engagement metrics are a key indicator of sender reputation. High open and click-through rates demonstrate that recipients find your emails valuable. Conversely, low engagement and high complaint rates can damage your reputation. Encourage recipient interaction by creating engaging content and segmenting your audience for targeted campaigns.
3. Manage Domain Reputation
Managing a clean domain reputation is a part of a clean sender’s reputation. Spam filters determine your domain’s reputation based on certain metrics. These metrics are provided below,
Complaint rate: Complaint rate is the percentage of emails that have been marked as spam by the recipients. The standard complaint rate is below 0.1%.
Inbox placement rate: as the name suggests, inbox placement rate determines the number of your emails that have reached to your recipient’s inbox. The standard IPR is above 80%.
Spam placement rate: this metric tells of the percentage of emails that ended up in spam folder. The optimal percentage for this metric is 10%.
Hard bounce rate: the optimal hard bounce rate is 2%, it refers to the number of emails that bounced back due to invalid or non-existent recipient address. Hard bounce rate is a valuable metric ands should be taken under consideration seriously.
4. Write the right email
Just because you are promoting your product or service, doesn’t mean you can write just about anything. Content filtering is a standard way of pushing your emails towards the spam box and you definitely wouldn’t want that. As mentioned earlier into this article, content filters check incoming email contents for blacklisted keywords, trigger words, suspicious links and other doubtful elements. There are a few takeaways from this:
- Write a clear, conscious subject line. Avoid placing click-baits.
- Do not type words in all caps, that is considered as a bad manner
- Use personalized subject lines
- Combining plain text with images (60% text and 40% images) is a good practice to take on account regarding body text.
- Keep your HTML part error-free. Make sure to have no broken tags within your email template.
- Make sure your email content doesn’t have any grammatical errors.
5. Engage your recipients
Engaging your recipients is paramount to maintaining a healthy email reputation and avoiding the dreaded spam folder. Instead of treating email as a broadcast medium, view it as a conversation. Active engagement signals to email providers that your content is valuable and desired, significantly reducing the likelihood of your messages being flagged as spam.
Firstly, encourage interaction. Implement clear calls to action, prompt replies, and include interactive elements like polls or quizzes. Personalized content that resonates with individual interests fosters a sense of connection, driving engagement. Segment your audience and tailor your emails to their specific needs and preferences.
Secondly, respect your recipients' inboxes. Avoid sending excessive emails; prioritize quality over quantity. Consistent delivery schedules and relevant content create anticipation rather than annoyance. Ensure your emails are mobile-friendly and visually appealing, enhancing the user experience and encouraging interaction.
Thirdly, prioritize list hygiene. Regularly remove inactive subscribers and provide clear unsubscribe options. This demonstrates respect for your recipients' preferences and improves your sender reputation. Encourage feedback and address concerns promptly, fostering trust and loyalty.
Finally, monitor your engagement metrics. Track open rates, click-through rates, and reply rates. Analyze this data to understand what resonates with your audience and refine your email strategy accordingly. High engagement metrics signal positive interactions to email providers, reducing the likelihood of your emails being marked as spam. By creating a dialogue and delivering valuable, relevant content, you can cultivate a loyal audience and ensure your emails reach their intended recipients.
6. Implement a robust email infrastructure
The last but one of the most crucial factors for bulk email senders is implementing a robust email infrastructure. No matter what your condition is, you should never compromise while choosing a provider. For making sure that all of your emails are landing in your recipient’s inbox, you need to opt for a reliable provider. And not only that make sure to set up your mail server properly while keeping consideration of every single factor that may impact your email IPR.
Make sure to perform an adequate amount of mail testing before starting to send out your emails to your customers and prospects. There are several mail tester tools that warns you about each of the areas in which your emails are lacking. If those mail testers show a red alert in case of spam score, you might need to re-write and re-design your emails. Mail testers will also show if your IP is listed in any of the international blacklists or not. Hence, testing your emails thoroughly before starting with your campaign is certainly one of the best strategies to avoid your emails landing in spam box. Testing emails using those tools doesn’t require extra expenses or effort, so make sure to squeeze that in within your daily tasks.
Conclusion
In the conclusion it can be stated that avoiding your mails landing in spam boxes are something you can control. Hence, make sure to go through everything with due observance and get everything in the right order before starting with your campaign. This will guarantee you’re the best possible results in the course of your email campaigns.
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