Tag: spam

How to avoid your email marketing looking like spam

Have you noticed how spammers and scammers use personal names rather than brand names in the “from” section of their emails? Usually they’re female names.

Here’s a recent example.

Spam example

The reason why they do this is hopefully obvious. It’s so that the email looks like it’s from a real person.

My tip to avoid looking like a spammer.

Use your business name as the “from” name.
If you use your own name, and not everyone on your list knows who you are, this may affect your open rate. I receive a lot of email marketing emails done like this. Another option is to use your business name followed by your own name. Eg. From: [Expertise on Tap – Julian Wellings]

But why? Surely you want to prevent people from unsubscribing?

No. We say make it easy to unsubscribe. Here’s why.

Making it easy to unsubscribe…

1. Cleans your list ensuring you’re not wasting money emailing people unnecessarily.

2. Ensures you’re only communicating with people who want to hear from you.

3. Means people are less likely to report as spam. Too many spam complaints will affect your sender reputation and you could even end up on a spam blacklist. Google, Hotmail and AOL have a “report spam” button which people will click if they can’t easily find the unsubscribe link.

4. Provides a much better user experience and leads to less frustration. Every subscriber interaction with your business should be as positive as possible.

Our top tips for easy unsubscribe

Include an unsubscribe link in the header of your e-newsletter along with a permission reminder of why they are receiving it.
Include a second unsubscribe link at the end of the e-newsletter. Make it part of the main body of the email, don’t hide it in the small print footer. And do make it legible.

Below are two recent examples of poor unsubscribe positioning.

In both cases the unsubscribe link is buried in the lengthy small print text at the foot of the newsletters and are very difficult to find.

Example 1:

Unsubscribe example
Example 2

Unsubscribe example

How to avoid your email marketing looking like spam

Have you noticed how spammers and scammers use personal names rather than brand names in the “from” section of their emails? Usually they’re female names.

My tip to avoid looking like a spammer.

Email marketing – why you should make it easy to unsubscribe