Spam How Much Will It Cost Your Business
By Shelley Lowery
According to a recent study conducted by Ferris Research,
a market and technology research firm specializing in
messaging and collaboration, Spam will cost U.S. businesses
over $10 billion in 2003.
Spam not only clogs our servers and in-boxes, but it
also costs us hours and hours of lost time in productivity.
Although the estimated cost of Spam focuses mainly
on lost productivity, this picture may be much broader
than you realize.
Some of the more popular email providers, such as AOL
(America Online), Yahoo! and Hotmail, are now utilizing
filters to cut down on Spam. These filters are dumping
Spam and/or bulk mailings into a separate location.
Although this may cut down on Spam in your in-box, these
filters are also dumping some legitimate email messages.
What's more, some hosting services not only filter
the email messages, but they're also blocking entire
hosting companies. For example, the blocking host may
have gotten some Spam complaints about a few marketers
that host with ABC hosting company. (Keep in mind, ABC
hosting company may host thousands of sites.) Rather
than block the offending marketers, the blocking host
decides to blacklist the entire ABC host.
What this means is if you try to contact someone and
their hosting company has blacklisted your host, your
email will not go through -- it will bounce right back
to you.
If you suspect you may not be receiving all of your
email, contact your host and ask them if they're using
Spam filters or have blocked entire hosting companies.
How Much Will Spam Cost Your Business?
How much time do you spend sorting through the Spam
in your email each day? Add it up sometime -- I'll bet
you'll find you spend a lot more time than you even
realized -- time that could have been spent on your
business.
If you're publishing an ezine or sending out any form
of opt-in mailings, how many subscribers are actually
receiving your mailings? Most-likely, not nearly as
many subscribers as you may think. How many lost sales
has this cost you?
How many messages, such as information requests, customer
support requests, etc., have you not received due to
filtering?
How many messages have you replied to that your customers
or potential customers have never received due to filtering?
As customer service says a lot about your business
practices, how many customers will you lose?
The list goes on and on. But the point is this, Spam
is costing you dearly.
Protecting Your Email Address
So how can you defend yourself? Well, it depends on
which side you're on -- how to protect yourself, and/or
how to make sure your messages are getting through.
In order to protect yourself against Spam, you first
need to understand how your email address is obtained.
There are many unethical businesses online that collect
and sell email addresses. They use robots that travel
from link to link in search of email addresses. Their
customers are led to believe that these email addresses
belong to individuals who want to receive mailings.
However, much of the time, this isn't the case.
Never purchase a list of email addresses from anyone
other than a reputable company. The only company I can
recommend is Post Master Direct. http://www.postmasterdirect.com
To protect your email address from these robots, instead
of displaying your address on your site, use a feedback
form. Not just any type of form, but a form that doesn't
display your email address within the hidden form fields.
The only form I can recommend is Master Feedback. You
can pick up a free copy here: http://willmaster.com/master/feedback/index.shtml
Anytime you're filling out a form online and you're
asked to provide your email address, make sure you review
the site's "Privacy Policy" to ensure that your email
address will not be sold or shared with a third party.
Protecting Your In-box
To protect your in-box, you can use a Spam filtering
software program. Although there are several available
online, the best one I've found is Mail Washer. This
program will enable you to view all the email on your
server without actually downloading it into your email
program. Once you've reviewed your messages, you can
create filters and bounce the Spam messages back to
the sender. Although you can pick up the program free,
consider supporting the developer and register the software
for a small fee. http://www.mailwasher.net
Avoiding the Spam Filters
If you're sending out a mailing to an opt-in list,
there are a few steps you can take to make sure your
message won't trip the Spam filters:
1) Avoid using trigger words, such as Spam, fr*e, r*move,
etc. Although the list is far too broad to list here,
you can learn more by reading the following articles:
Spam Filters Run-Amuck by Timothy A. Gross http://www.iprofitsystems.com/articles/spamfilters.html
CLIP & SAVE guide to avoiding Spam filters by Debbie
Weil http://www.imakenews.com/wordbiz/e_article000094161.cfm
2) Avoid using JavaScript within your messages.
3) Avoid using "bad" words. If you'd like to ensure
your messages are getting through, consider opening
email accounts with the popular providers. You can send
your mailings to these accounts and monitor their reception.
If your mailings land in the dump, you can make some
adjustments or even contact the company. If you would
like to test your outgoing email messages to ensure
they won't trigger a Spam filter, Ken Evoy offers a
great service called SpamCheck. This free service will
enable you to send a copy of your publication, or any
email message, to a specific address and it will return
a report of possible words that will trigger the Spam
filters.
Send your publication including the subject and body
to:
mailto:spamcheck-websource@sitesell.net
Conclusion
The Spam problem continues to get progressively worse.
Although there isn't a simple solution to the problem,
the information provided in this article should assist
you in not only avoiding Spam, but also avoiding the
filters for your legitimate mailings.
It's really a shame we're even in this position. However,
we cannot allow Spam to continue to infiltrate our businesses.
We must take the necessary steps to ensure our success.
Copyright © Shelley Lowery 2003. All Rights Reserved
About the Author:
Shelley Lowery is the author of several successful ebooks
including Web Design Mastery - An in-depth guide to
professional web design. Ebook Starter - A Complete
Ebook Design Kit, and eZines: A Complete Guide to Publishing
for Profit. Subscribe to Etips and receive a free copy
of her highly acclaimed ebook, "Killer Internet Marketing
Strategies." http://www.web-source.net
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