« March 2006 | Main | May 2006 »
April 25, 2006
Yahoo Blames Speed on Spam
I love that Yahoo goes on to blame the speed of email being deliverd on spam. Has email and spam become a greater scape goat to throw on a problem?
"Jim, sorry I did not get your email last week... must have been flagged as spam and my inbox just deletes them at the end of each day. Yeah I know you were emailing to buy something, but have you ever tried the phone...."
I have personally seen in the last two weeks Yahoo fail to deliver an email from my own wife in less than 8 hours. That is sending me an email not vice versa. And mine to her, maybe a day. And another one of our partners who uses Yahoo Business Hosting Services and Email, has been blacklisted for over 3 weeks with SORBS (not them, the WHOLE Yahoo IP address) and we can't get mail from them. So they have to use thier back up personal HOTMAIL accounts.
Yahoo Plagued By Slow Email, Analysis Shows
A small security firm in Iowa says it has discovered why Yahoo's email is sometimes slow.
An analysis of Yahoo Inc. mail servers found that they were only able to accept email about half the time on average, making it likely that email was taking longer than normal to deliver, the security firm said Friday.
In testing 16 Yahoo mail servers, Dymeta Inc., based in Bettendorf, Iowa, found on average that the servers were unable to accept email 45 percent of the time, and the number of available servers ranged from as low as four to as high as 12, Aaron Gillette, chief technician for the company, said.
"We're not saying that mail isn't going to get through, but it's likely to take longer than normal," Gillette said. "Normally, when you send email from one account to another, you can expect it to be delivered in minutes. With the problems they've got, it could take hours or even days to get through, or it could be bounced back entirely."
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:19 PM | Permalink
Email vs RSS - Rocks vs Missles
Interesting article on bloggers and email vs RSS use. This was from Sept 2005 (a whopping 8 months ago) which in internet time is like dog years. So take this with a grain of salt. We actually see a larger subscription rate to this blog to date by email sign ups still, but the RSS feed subscription is gaining ground. We see a 3 in 5 are using email at the emailwars.com.
My recommendation to bloggers: consider using this product. There are a lot of people out there who have not made the jump to RSS readers yet. You want to get your content in front of them, and this is another way to do it. Based on some stats that Fred Wilson (an investor in FeedBurner) published last year, we can expect about 1 email subscriber for every 5 RSS subscribers.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:59 AM | Permalink
April 21, 2006
Email Marketing in China - Some Lessons
From and article our team found over this past weekend on China.
Email Marketing in China
According to Danny Levinson, Managing Partner for BDL Media Ltd, a China-based email list management company, Yahoo! and Hotmail claim to be the number one email providers in China. However, 126.com, Netease.com, Sohu.com are probably the top three local providers in reality. Internet users generally have 1.6 email accounts, and according to the CNNIC, a whopping 80.3% use free personal accounts while just 12.1% get email at-work accounts. Users send approximately 3.7 emails per week and receive 5.2 per week (not including spam.) “With the rise of the Internet,” says Levinson, “companies think they can sell anywhere in the world. Which is true to a certain extent. I’m in China and ordered books through Amazon. But selling a product to the Chinese is a little different, depending on how the sale is transacted and how the product is delivered.” Levinson emphasizes Morris’ point that you really need to set up a presence in China in for either licensing, sales support, manufacturing, regulations or a combination of all of these. What does this have to do with email marketing? “We get calls from companies every week who want to market to China but don’t have a presence here. We turn down 99% of them because the product is illegal, the product being marketed has little if any Chinese-language backup support (which hurts us in the end because our users stop trusting our messages), or we’re being contacted by known spammers. Bottom line if you want to do email marketing to China? Worry first about setting up a presence here.” For companies that have set up shop, the types of emails sent out vary by industry. KFC and Pizza Hut are testing viral e-coupons. However, coupons don’t really work the same way in China as they do in the US. Instead, individual stores will issue their own coupons that can be used only at specific locations. Airlines and hotels send out emails that are similar to those sent out in Europe and US and work well, according to Levinson. In terms of formatting, Levinson advises you to include all your text in the body of the HTML and not as part of an image. Javascript is not permitted in email and any forms linking to external servers must use the GET command instead of POST. You should run your subject lines by someone locally as certain words and punctuation will not be allowed. He also advises that you limit capitalized words -– no more than 5% of the total email should contain fully-capitalized words.
Landing Pages and Microsites for Chinese Campaigns:
You'll need to redesign completely for this market. (Link to samples below.) The Chinese read from right to left and up and down, so you really can’t translate English and slap it up on a previously-templated page. Plus, Web design conventions are completely different in China. The Chinese like their sites to be packed with information, animation, and color. And, you want to make sure you aren’t posting something that is a cultural no-no, such as the wrong colors or phrases. Be sure to partner with a reputable local hosting company to ensure your target market can enjoy your landing page or microsite. The China Firewall, according to Unze, dictates that you should strongly consider hosting your site within Mainland China. The Chinese government has been known to block sites hosted outside China for minor violations to their content code. Also, the thread connecting China to the rest of the Internet is thin – approximately 136 Gbs is available for International access for over a hundred million Internet users (although market forces are slowly improving these numbers).
Chinese Ecommerce Still in Initial Stages
Don't judge the success of your microsite or ad campaign by ecommerce sales alone just yet -- although signs are good for the future. According to Morgan Stanley, the CNNIC reported that 42% of online Chinese consumers used online payment in 2004, up from 16% in 2001. Remember, the Chinese have only had access to credit cards for a few years. In China, e-commerce is tied to people’s mobile phone carriers or to prepaid point cards that people buy online through Shanda and Netease or at Internet cafes. SmartPay is an online payment startup that links users’ bank accounts to their mobile phone number. And, while PayPal is making some inroads in China, it’s not used for international transactions the way it is in the US –- mostly because of the government’s restriction on RMB leaving the country. On auction sites like TaoBao, for example, a buyer may look for the product, email or IM the seller, and then meet face-to-face to finalize the transaction. TaoBao buyers and sellers can also use AliPay, which is the online escrow service developed by Alibaba, the company who now owns Yahoo! China. With AliPay, sellers can collect money from buyers and hold it an escrow account until the seller gives the buyer the merchandise.
Chinese Blogs Mushrooming
Blogs, according to Technorati's Marketing Director Derek Gordon, are exploding all over China particularly in the big coastal cities. “The Chinese blogs we see,” he says, “are primarily for social or career networking purposes, but there is an increasing use of blogs for both academic and business uses.” The Chinese government, however, places significant control over what is posted. Gordon reports the government has been very heavy-handed with MSN’s Spaces (the largest blog hosting platform operating in China) and Google’s Blogger. That being said, Gordon thinks blogging is a great way for businesses in the US to establish a more intimate relationship with their customers –- assuming, of course, you can blog effectively in the local language.
Overall Strategy & Creative Tips for Interactive Campaigns to China -- Think Colorful and Integrated
“To reach the Chinese,” states Morris, “you have to be here –- in China, that is. You have to see the road shows, the throngs of people and their mobile phones, the Internet cafes, everything. You need first-hand knowledge of how people interact with brands and how they receive advertising messages.” “In China,” he adds, “you can’t do what works in the US. For example, you can’t run a campaign where consumers collect codes from product packaging and then turn them in for free downloadable music. For the Chinese, music is already free so this type of promotion won’t capture their interest at all.” The key, says Morris, is building emotion into the brand and making the promotion revolve around the consumer, not your product. “You have to make the product exciting and unique. Marketing in China isn’t about having dancers on the street corner, it’s about letting your audience dance. You have to get them to interact with your brand. In China, passive marketing will not work. Period.” Touching consumers at multiple media points is critical. If you’re introducing a product, you’ll need to tap into the Web, mobile advertising, road shows, games, and current events, such as the World Cup in order to capture people’s interest. Plus, you’ll also need to incorporate “traditional” tactics such as Internet cafe wall “billboards” (posters), and freebies such as drink mats for bars. Campaigns need to be integrated, slick, creative, and most important, interactive. Two examples (link to samples below):
1. Motorola's Internet Café Competition
Motorola recently hosted a three-city competition through the GOQO game platform. At the end of each round players could choose to answer questions about Motorola phones. By answering the questions players earned points or gadgets to help them in the next round of the game. Final rounds were held in person in three large Internet cafes packed with crowds. The winners received their oversized checks on the spot.
2. Vidal Sassoon's Integrated Hong Kong campaign
Procter & Gamble ran an integrated campaign to reintroduce Vidal Sassoon into Hong Kong last year. The entire campaign created by the HyperFactory revolved around a cat-woman-type model. The heart of the campaign focused on a game consumers downloaded to their mobile phones. Each time the player advanced to the game’s next level, he/she uncovered key visuals of the creative execution as well as scoring points. Scores were uploaded to a leader board in real time – a new twist for mobile games of this type. “Generally, people play games and then they see their score at the end. This is the first time we had a live leader board where people could compare results with their friends,” reports The HyperFactory's Handley. Players invited their friends by inputting their mobile number via SMS – an action which earned them bonus points in real time. The campaign also included cat-suited women dancing outside of bars handing out free samples, branded drink mats, posters and table tents, exclusive ‘cat woman’ MSN Messenger emoticons, screen savers, banner ads, and a text-to-win competition with drink and food purchases.
Working with China-based agencies and Internet media
Whether or not you have an office in China, you will need to find a local partner you trust who can help you navigate China’s advertising complexities, including working with the national and provincial governments, building “Gaunxi” or relationships and networks, and interpreting for you at business meetings. Two quick tips to help you work with your China-based partner:
Tip #1. Push for real results Jeff Unze, President Lucky Pacific, a firm specializing in affiliate marketing in China, advises that you ensure any numbers you get are based on real ROI. “People in China will lead you to their friends, partners, etc. who will present you nebulous numbers,” he says. He also adds that you need to hold your partner’s feet to the fire. “If you work with an ad agency in China, that agency is your local partner. You want to make sure they are turning over all the rocks for you. And, in China, people tend to be very conservative when making decisions because they don’t want to make a mistake. “For example, when I worked at SINA, we approached the local office of Nike to talk about a sponsorship and tie-in with the World Cup – it was a great opportunity for Nike because it was the first time China was in the World Cup and Nike wasn’t exactly a household name in China at the time. “The local office was unresponsive to our offer – because to them, it was an incredibly risky proposition compared to magazine or TV advertising – so we ended up pitching the International VP of Marketing in Beavertown, Oregon directly, who then contacted the Shanghai office. The deal went through the local office as a ‘face-saving’ measure and ended up being a successful multi-year sponsorship opportunity. And of course, Nike is now huge in China." The Chinese are very creative, natural marketers,” sums up Unze, “but to take advantage of this you need to reassure them they won’t be ‘punished’ for taking risks.” Tip #2. Email and phone calls may not be returned The Chinese prefer to do business face-to-face. If you send email to even a large site or portal inquiring about ad rates, don’t be surprised if no one returns your email. You’ll need a local agency or representative to make the initial call for you –- although, surprisingly, the Chinese will negotiate terms via IM, according to Unze. Last but not least -- this is harder than you think When marketing to Chinese consumers, Isobar’s Morris sums it up succinctly, “Don’t underestimate the Chinese and their sophistication. It is very difficult to make money in China – so you have to market smart to achieve success.”
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 10:44 AM | Permalink
In China You Belong to the Man
China has enacted a new law that regulates the ownership and use through licensing of email servers. It is a good approach as a large volume of spam originates from servers and zombie servers in China. I know that we are looking at entering China this year and knowing the rules of each country, and especially these, really helps is your strategy to new markets.
China uses spam law to take over email providers
China's new spam law hides a couple of disturbing details:1. Email Service Providers must be licensed to operate, and;.
2. ESPs must keep copies of everyones' mail for 2 months..Those who submit then get the opportunity to negotiate China's version of CAN-SPAM's gauntlet, including "ADV" in commercial message Subject lines, stop sending on request, and no open relays or zombies.
The Chinese law doesn't seem all that different from Western efforts... until you consider the way things really work today as the authoritarian country that birthed several of the world's greatest civilizations marches to its new reality, as the Backgrounder that follows shows.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:16 AM | Permalink
April 20, 2006
I HEART My Crackberry
How many of you, and more importantly how many of your customers are using mobile devices to read email? I know that at our agency eROI we are at about a 10% penetration rate. We live and die by these little pocket sized gems. This article should help you understand the shifting importance on time shifting and device shifting in regard to email marketing. I wonder if this will lead to more SMS campaigns in the future with unique URLs to track results.
One question that begs an answer is what is the best way to find out if your audience is reading email on these devices. My answer is survey and ask. Ask them to update profile information on device preferences for email. It might help you to segment and target users based on location in the future.
Liberation Through Mobile E-Mail?Can mobile e-mail really help us achieve a better work-life balance?
After spending an hour or so trudging through inane messages and spam, many of us tend to think that e-mail has made our work lives more hectic. However, a new study from Visto, a provider of wireless e-mail platforms for mobile devices, suggests otherwise.Amid concerns about the continuing erosion of personal time, Visto's research "suggests that mobile e-mail can deliver renewed control over the working day for the individual with improved productivity for the employer."
According to the survey, 70% of frequent business travelers with a heavy reliance on e-mail expect mobile e-mail to free up their schedules and they actively want mobile phones with the ability to receive and send both work and personal e-mails.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:45 AM | Permalink
April 19, 2006
Utah Spam Law - Yeilds One Citation
But it is to a Canadian Company and they don't care. I emplore you to read this article as this whole law is really messed up. We need to have one national law and not one for every state. It makes it too hard to control and is really (as you will read) a ploy to make someone else some money. On that note, Why should anti spammmers look to make money the same way spammers are? Ahhhh, America, what a Great country.
Critics say spam law failing to guard kids
E-mail registry: Created to shield children from adult ads, some now call it a money-making scheme
Dennis Jolley hasn't been deluged by offensive e-mail pictures and solicitations. Nor has his 4-year-old son, who hasn't quite figured out how to send or open an e-mail.
Still, several months ago, the Salt Lake City father signed up for Utah's Child Protection Registry anyway - just to be sure no unwanted pornography ever slips through.
"If they want to produce porn, that's their right. But I want to be able to say I don't want it to come into my house unsolicited - by any method," Jolley says.
Jolley is one of about 2,600 Utahns who have individually joined the state's fledgling registry. Another 100,000 have been signed up by Webmasters - including those for 27 school districts - who control their e-mail domain addresses.
Utah's registry is meant to protect children from adult-themed e-mails, including advertisements for cigars, wine clubs and porn. As often as once a month, 300 companies comply with the law's requirement to pay a half-cent to check each e-mail on their solicitation list.
The brainchild of a couple of friends who persuaded lawmakers in Utah and Michigan to adopt legislation and then created a Park City-based business to run the filter, the registry has generated an estimated $68,000 for the company and $17,000 in state fees. It has led to one citation.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 6:01 AM | Permalink
April 18, 2006
Have You Seen Our Two Other Blogs
I wanted to take a moment to turn you on to 2 of our other blogs if you have not seen them yet.
Email Days is a collection of emails that are good, bad, funny and odd that trickle into our inboxes.
Return on Subscriber is focused on what works and techniques to learn from for email marketing.
Enjoy.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 6:01 PM | Permalink
Bonded Sender Now Sender Score
I am excited to see that Return Path has updated and actually made over the Bonded Sender program. We have been using Bonded Sender Iron Port servers since the dawn of time (or so it feels like). It was high time that this program and system got the full treatment. Thanks to the team at Return Path for making the changes, listening to marketers, ESPs and ISPs, and building on a solid system that has been one of the leading systems for years.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:13 PM | Permalink
The Next Step After Email Authentication
I came across an intersting article from Kevin Newcomb at Clickz. Basically the top tier email marketers and ESPs embraced SenderID and Domain Keys (60% they claim) but he thinks that the next step is reputation services. I agree that it is on the horizon and think that the Return Path and Habeas solutions are two of the best ones out there, not just on price alone, but they are more encompassing than the current Goodmail solution. I think that most email marketers and ESPs would readily embrace, if not faster, a standard of one of these two rather quickly. I know that having to pay multiple vendors for anyone is a challenge. Are you planning on learning more and implementing authentication for your email marketing efforts?
The embrace of e-mail authentication by commercial senders, one of the key issues facing the e-mail industry, is coming along nicely.The adoption level grew by 60 percent last year and is at a point where most large commercial senders are using one or both of the two dominant frameworks. According to data from the E-mail Senders & Providers Coalition (ESPC), more than 35 percent of all mail now sent is being authenticated.
The logical question many e-mail stakeholders are now asking is, what comes next? At the second annual E-mail Authentication Summit this week in Chicago, many of them will take up that question, discussing what will drive further adoption, issues of enforcement, and how to layer on reputation services once a sender's identity is known.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:04 AM | Permalink
April 17, 2006
AOL accused of email censorship
AOL is blocking all emails addressed at its subscribers that reference a campaign opposing the provider's Goodmail Certified Email programme.
Emails containing the DearAOL.com web address are bounced back to the sender. A test email sent by vnunet.com on Thursday afternoon was returned. The error message linked to a web page that explained that:
"There is at least one URL in your email that is generating substantial complaints from AOL members."
Read Article
http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2154127/aol-accused-email-censorship
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 8:52 PM | Permalink
April 14, 2006
Audio Interview with Dylan Boyd
This is a little self promotion, but indulge me. I spent some time with an agency partner of ours being interviewed on the state of email marketing. If is worth your 20ish minutes if you are interesting in hearing it. Peter has put togehter a strong line up of presenters each week and is worth of your RSS subscription.
I hope that you enjoy it.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:00 AM | Permalink
April 13, 2006
Goodmail Is Not Meant to Stop Spam
This might be the dumbest thing I have heard in a long time. Read the testimony below about Goodmail infront of the CA Legsislature. It is not going to make a difference in spam, but just validate what should legitimately get to the inbox with AOL and Yahoo. So does not really fix the problem, admitantly, just adds another layer of cost and complexity?
Goodmail CEO: CertifiedEmail Not Meant to Decrease Spam
Goodmail CEO Richard Gingras told advocacy groups and legislators at a California Senate committee hearing last week that its fee-based CertifiedEmail program - which Yahoo and AOL are implementing - is about authentication, not reducing spam, DM News reports.
"The purpose is to restore trust to email," said Gingras. "To suggest that the introduction of CertifiedEmail is going to prevent spammers from sending spam or phishers from trying to phish - we have not said it, nor would any expert say it."
"It helps us increase emails of good, trusted, authenticated email ... and that's what consumers want," said AOL spokesman Nicholas Graham. "If we can put an end to spoofs, scams and hoaxes by giving legitimate senders of email a new path, a new way to send email, we believe more phishers will give up and throw in the towel."
The committee also heard from several small groups still concerned that their email will be stopped in spam filters and that they will be charged a fee - even though AOL has offered to cover for nonprofits' email expenses.
AOL and Yahoo plan to complete implementation of CertifiedEmail within the next few months.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 11:01 PM | Permalink
April 12, 2006
Copycats Gold Rush the Goodmail Idea
Seems like many companies are trying to provide a solution to the Goodmail one. Looks like if there is a buyer... a market grows.
Intellectual property company Sticky Web, Inc. has said they would compile an opt-in database of names and email addresses to help combat spam. Sticky Web holds several Internet and software patents. The company believes that their opt-in-specific email technology patent could help build a delivery system that could guarantee and certify email delivery.
The opt-in system would charge commercial emailers a small fee for email delivery. “Raising the delivery cost of commercial OPT-IN e-mail is gaining traction as an accepted cost of business marketing,” said Sticky Web CEO Tom DiStefano in a statement. He cited plans by AOL and Yahoo to implement a ¼-1 cent charge on email delivered to their customers.
Users of Sticky Web’s email solution can sent email to specific lists, and get real-time tracking results about whether their emails were received or not. The resulting data is designed to help email businesses determine the best pricing strategy for email delivery. “Raising the cost of commercial e-mail is a key tool in defeating the illegitimate bulk e-mailers responsible for the SPAM epidemic by creating a pricing structure for delivery of OPT-IN e-mail that bars entry to Spammers,” added DiStefano.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 9:54 AM | Permalink
April 11, 2006
ISP Pays for Blocking Legitimate Emails
I like this line in the policy blaming spammers for the reason why legitimate opt in emailers are being blocked. Lousy line. That is like saying well Jim Smith was speeding, so we are going to shut down the freeway. Lazy effort to a legitimate problem.
Verizon to pay for SPAM blocking methods
Verizon has settled a class action lawsuit that accused the ISP of blocking legitimate email. In 2003 Verizon began to block a massive amount of IP addresses which in some cases blocked entire countries. Verizon did this to limit the amount of Spam their customers received. However the blocking had a major side effect, it also prevented legitimate email from reaching their users. Verizon DSL and Dial-up customers complained about the blocking and begged Verizon to turn off the filters but the company did not do so until a lawsuit was filed. The blocking began in October of 2004 and ended in May of 2005.Verizon customers who can prove that a legitimate piece of email from Asia and Europe, did not arrive or was blocked between October 1st 2004 and May 31st 2005 can receive up to $49 USD.
The lawyers who faught the case have asked Verizon to pay them $1.4 million USD. I guess we know whose interest those lawyers were looking after.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 6:44 AM | Permalink
April 10, 2006
State Kids’ No-E-Mail Bills Dead
The kids’ do-not-e-mail juggernaut that for the last year has threatened to legal adult content as well is grinding to a halt—at least for now.
So many bills have been introduced that are rather confusing as well as could be very costly to those trying to email to certain states. It it odd to try to establish a bill for each state when often times you have no idea where a person is physically located. And even if you do, what if they move? How will you track and stay up with this? And will they truthfully tell you where they really are?
I think that if you want to create a bill like this, you need not only to do it at the federal level, but also educate the public about the impact it will or could have on emails that they opt in to.
A bill in Georgia that would have established so-called child protection do-not-e-mail registry died last week. A similar bill in Connecticut was gutted. Similar bills in Iowa, Wisconsin, and Hawaii are also either dead or languishing. And an Illinois kids’ no-e-mail bill was also killed earlier this year.
Though child do-not e-mail registries in Utah and Michigan still pose significant threats to e-mail containing legal adult content, other states allowing their registry bills to die or gutting them indicates the tide may be turning in marketers’ favor.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 7:06 AM | Permalink
April 8, 2006
Need to Send More Troops to the Fronts
While the federal CAN-SPAM law that was enacted two years ago has allowed prosecutors to put some big-name spammers behind bars, the law has also caused significant headaches for legitimate marketers who are trying to stay compliant, according to one attorney.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 10:06 AM | Permalink
April 7, 2006
The Effect of "Mark This As Spam" Defined
I found this to be a good clear read from Kirill Popov over at emailLabs. I continue to wonder what all of the ISP "Report this and Mark this as Spam/Junk" effect on overall delivery is to marketers. This article helps to shed some light on how it all works.
If you're concerned that your email messages get blocked because one or two recipients are erroneously reporting them as spam, here's some reassurance: ISPs generally don't base decisions on whether to block or clear a particular email message solely on a handful of user reports, because those reports are wrong so often.Two panelists at a recent meeting of the Messaging Anti-Abuse Working Group (MAAWG), representing Yahoo! and anti-spam service provider Cloudmark, said "Not Spam" or "Report Spam" buttons are effective only a certain percentage of the time.
Many users click the buttons erroneously, they said – users either hit the "Report Spam" button by accident or because they think they can use it to unsubscribe, or they mark a phishing email, such as a fraudulent request for sensitive financial information, as "Not Spam" in the bulk folder.Because the reports can be unreliable, a few complaints about a specific email don't factor heavily by themselves in an ISP's decision whether to filter or block an email message or to deliver it to the inbox. Instead, ISPs look at patterns of complaints and correlate with other sending behavior to decide who gets blocked.
So, you don't have to worry about a competitor trying to sabotage your campaign by reporting your emails as spam, as long as your other email practices are clean.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 6:34 AM | Permalink
April 6, 2006
21 Percent of Emails Not Delivered by ISPs
Quite interesting that Return Path has found that many ISPs are having a problem or blocking so much email in tests that they have run. I can really understand this as a client in SF that uses Yahoo Business Hosting and email services has been blacklisted. Not because they are a spammer, but because someone has been using the IP they are all co-located on to spend spam and many blacklists like SpamCop and Sorbs have listed them. So business emails cannot be delivered to many clients.
On the flip side looks like ISPs are using the reverse block technique on everyone else. I understand that they are "protecting" the customer, but when do they get to decide what you opt in for and what you didn't? When can they not deliver my mail?
Some 20.5 percent of permission-based commercial email was either delivered to junk mail folders or not delivered at all in the second half of 2005, according to a research brief (pdf) from Return Path, MediaPost writes. The non-delivery rate varied by internet service provider (ISP), with Excite and Gmail filtering out the most emails (42.9 percent and 40.4 percent, respectively) and Earthlink and Mac.com filtering out the least (7.8 percent and 8.1 percent, respectively).
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 9:08 AM | Permalink
EA to PSP Fight Night players: Pay us or we'll spam you
This was an interesting post I saw this week on an individual thought about the value of an email address. Basically if a gamer wants to play the new online game from EA, they either pay or have to give an opt in. I guess pay to play has new meaning. Is the value of your own email address too steep of a price today to get information, participate in a game, or even get a case study too much to ask? As a marketer I think we need to give to get, but also create new channles if the audience has a problem with it. This might be the minority, but it gives a new look into the value of an address.
Hello EA, this post is about you.It appears you have a choice when you try to play Fight Night Round 3 online through your PSP. You either cough up some money, US$2 in fact, or give them your email and address. Not a good choice, even though most of us can make up an email address and mailing address. The whole thing is fairly ominous though. EA is basically saying "Pay us or we'll spam you."
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 6:04 AM | Permalink
April 5, 2006
Senator Wants Goodmail Delay; AOL Prepares to Go Ahead
Could a legal challenge to the Goodmail system delay the implementation of this new partnership? I doubt it, but it is rather interesting to see that some of those parties that back the CAN SPAM act. would challenge a system that should (jury is still out) help control some phishing and spam.
AOL is still "preparing implementation" of Goodmail CertifiedEmail in early April, a spokesman said, even though California state Sen. Dean Florez has asked the company to delay its implementation.While AOL Postmaster Charles Stiles agreed to testify at a hearing before the state's Senate Select Committee on E-Commerce, Wireless Technology and Consumer Driven Programming on April 3, Florez said AOL should delay implementing CertifiedEmail until "a very concerned public can get their questions answered."
"I am writing to request that, as a matter of good faith, AOL agree not to implement the Goodmail CertifiedEmail program before April 10 ... to ensure that there is adequate time for your testimony to take place," Florez wrote in a letter to Stiles.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 6:12 AM | Permalink
April 4, 2006
New Spam Technique Delivers Results for Spammers
Something that always keeps us all in this war for the inobx is the fact that spammers, no matter how many systems we put in place, will always find a new way to get around the blocks we create. It is a war that I think really does not have an near end in sight. This is why the market for Goodmail, Habeas, Return Path, and Spam Cube continue to exist.
We have started to get a little numb to the fact that junk is always going to be there, which is too bad, as it creates a misperception about all of the legitimate things that marketers are doing to educate, guide and walk down the right path to email marketing.
SoftScan announced today that in a bid to beat detection and increase the likelihood of their messages being read, spammers are increasingly using a new twist on joe-jobbing (forging the sender’s email address) that may lead to organisations abolishing the bounce back message.“The change in tactic demonstrates that spammers are having an increasingly hard time getting through anti-spam technologies and persuading users to open up their emails and at least read them,” comments Bo Engelbrechtsen, corporate communications manger of SoftScan.
Instead of forging the sender’s email address, which is easily detected by anti-spam technologies, and sending it directly to the target company; spammers are deliberately sending their messages to an email address they know does not exist at high profile company with the “from” email address of the target company.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 9:05 AM | Permalink
Why Not Own a Spam Cube?
Why not use another device on your desktop? I would like to see systems like this used by ISPs and corporations as opposed to another cosumer device. Time to get a SPAM CUBE.
Spam Cube could solve online headaches Spam Cube is a new technology to help reduce online headaches for PC users. It's a single box that hooks into home computers and filters junk email, viruses and so-called "phishing" attacks."This is the first anti-spam hardware to use artificial intelligence inside an embedded chip. This is patented technology proprietary to Spam Cube," Spam Cube's David Soares said. "It interprets trends and new variations of the spam. As far as anti-virus and anti-phish are concerned, we use Norton and McAfee signatures to update the Spam Cube on a continual basis. The Spam Cube is connected between the router and the cable modem or between the computer and the cable modem. You activate the product, it registers in our database, and then we continually update the product as new spam signatures and new virus signatures are released."
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 6:48 AM | Permalink
April 3, 2006
MIT hosts spam pow-wow
MIT held a conference today on Spam and invited many members of ISPs, companies working on technology to help us all and others. I noticed that they placed the event for later viewing.
MIT Media will be doing both live and delayed webcasting of the conference.
You will need RealPlayer version 8 or later for these webcasts.
News from the event:
'Why not let email recipients penalise bulk mailers?'The fight against spam, phishing and email fraud should focus on economic incentives and aiding law enforcement, according attendees at a conference examining the problem this week.
Speakers at MIT's 2006 Spam Conference were notably cognizant of the recent proposals of white lists and AOL's Goodmail, a pay per email service offering preferential treatment in email delivery for marketers. It is also one year since the implementation of Can-Spam, the federal law that sets email marketing standards and makes it less complicated for law enforcement to go after John Doe spammers.
Many addressed these issues head on. Others proposed solutions that would clearly bypass the issue of email postage, or creating a hierarchy of email senders, an idea that goes against the internet's equalising spirit.
Phil Raymond of Vanquish Labs, who presented on behalf of the Email Accountability Initiative, put it bluntly, "If you have a first class [car] on the train, there will be a lot of people in the cattle car and some of those cars will be left behind completely."
Read More
http://www.silicon.com/research/specialreports/thespamreport/0,39025001,39157640,00.htm
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 6:43 AM | Permalink
April 2, 2006
The Goodmail/Habeas Meeting at OMMA
I was able to attend an interesting event at the OMMA show this past week. It was the last event at the end of the day, but none the less, I had to be there. It featured the CEOs of Goodmail and Habeas. ReturnPath... where were you???
Here is what I heard. Unfortunately I only was able to snap one photo, but the way that Habeas cleverly threw Goodmail under the bus with open questions was worth the whole event itself.
Nice work Des in helping us to better understand what the real impact and relationship is with Goodmail and the ISPs.
Here is what I learned:
AOL is ONLY using Goodmail to deliver Rentention and Transactional emails, not prospecting opt in emails.
Goodmail/AOL program goes into effect in 3 weeks.
Yahoo will ONLY use Goodmail for Transactional emails and not any other types. So things like order conformations, banking emails, your order has shipped emails, etc.
Even if an organization uses Goodmail, the possibility of the email still getting dropped into the Junk folder is possible. If the end user has a rule based on the subject line, sender field or any other custom rules, it will over ride the Goodmail token with AOL users.
Habeas claims a 92% to 95% delivery to the inbox with the Top 5 ISPs when you use thier services. Without it they state that you could see a 73% inbox delivery rate.
AOL will still stick to it's benchmark of 2200 reports of Junk/Spam per 1,000,000 emails delivered by a sender. So no matter if you use Goodmail or any other system and your messages get marked as Junk or flagged as spam at the above rate, you could still get your delivery blocked or delayed.
One panelist stated "That those that are scruntinizing this program are those that are the most afraid of being scrutinized themselves." I found this to be a bad statement. I think that those that are concerned are those that are most worried about paying more money for delivery and are not the large companies out there with large cash reserves to spend on email delivery. Even those smaller companies (10,000 to 100,000 emails a month) that work with us and other ESPs are not able to justify paying more to send email marketing to customers that they already have opt in relationships with.
I would like to suggest that anyone that is in email marketing take some time this month to send simple emails to thier subscriber base making sure that they know when email is sent, who (sender name and email address) it will be coming from, and how to whitelist or add that address to their address book.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 5:36 AM | Permalink
April 1, 2006
Microsoft Bug Thwarts Google Spam Filtering
Was this a bug, or maybe just a battle between warring factions on the front lines of the battle? I am not saying that Microsoft is playing unfairly in an effort to hurt Google, but makes me think that why would it just hurt Google and not other mail filtering systems.
Microsoft bug cripples Google quantum-based spam filtering Google's quantum-based spam filtering launch was thrown into chaos today due to Microsoft Windows's inability to cope with Australia's daylight savings changes. Google's long-awaited quantum-based spam filtering project went online today, continuing the internet giant's tradition of launching new features, such as Gmail, on April 1.It uses quantum computing to reduce Gmail inboxes to an sub-atomic level, at which point the unusual laws of quantum physics allow Google to analyse infinite amounts of spam instantaneously.
Comments (0) | Posted by dylan at 9:08 PM | Permalink
Syndicate this site (XML)
