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Email messaging for your email campaign does not only have to satisfy your human subscribers, it should also meet senstive ISP spam filters. While we do our best to make sure your email gets delivered to your human subscribers inboxes, the onus is also on you to abide for email campaign best practices, or else run the risk of being sent to your subscriber's junk folder (by the ISP) or seeing higher rates of unsubscribe by your subscribers.

Here are some ways that you can improve your daily email campaign deliverability

1. Avoid excessive exclamation marks and ALL CAPS

'DO YOU ALWAYS TYPE LIKE THIS IN YOUR EMAIL BROADCAST. Well, do you ????????????'

Using ALL CAPS is a "internet speak" for shouting, and your subscribers might believe you are being rude. Using too much exclamation marks on the other hand makes you look like a 14 year old asking questions to her friend. Even worse, both will get you flagged by numerous ISPs  as junk emails.

What we recommend: Tone down on the ALL CAPS and the exclamation marks.

2. Try to avoid ActiveX, Javascript, or putting too much images in your emails.

Do you know that spam filters will flag emails with low text to images ratio? Images are a powertool tool to help create impressions out of your subscribers,  but you should use images in moderation in emails.

This is because spammers like to use images to avoid trigger words (see #3)  and as a result, this has made ISPs moderate and look suspiciously on emails with too much images compared to text.

What we recommend: Try to send your email broadcasts in simple TEXT ( this is the most trusted and common way people communicate over emails) . Use images sparingly- this is best to avoid ISPs filters and also will be appreciated by your readers.

Extra tips: If you use html or images in your emails, always assume that your subscribers has 'images will not display' policy. Never place important context of your email and use alt tags so those generic "X" dont appear.

3. Try to avoid TRIGGER words.

Some of the trigger words are obvious; like “Free,” “Save,” “$$,” or “Discount,” but some of them are less obvious, like “dear,” “click here,” and “enhancements.”

What we recommend: Try to 'speak' normally in your emails, and try to avoid too many instances of trigger words in your email.

4. Don't send big attachments

Large email attachments makes your emails bulky, slow and suspicious to ISPs. Attaching PDFs, putting too much images, or running messages that is way too long is not recomended.

What we recommend: If you have something large, put it on your website, and provide the links to download in the email.

5. Encourage your subscribers to whitelist your email

Due to 'overprotectiveness' (or is it leaning more towards overzelousness?) of spam filters, even your most avid subscribers of yours can miss out on your emails if these ISPs believe that the email is not good for the subscriber. Don't allow this to be a problem for you.

What we recommend: When your subscribers signs up, explicitly ask them to go to their email client and whitelist your email address or better yet, add your email to their address book.

6. Offer both text and html emails.

Email broadcast should never be one size fits all. Not all subscribers use email clients that can handle html based emails.

What we recommend: Always have a backup  of a text broadcast ready if you are using html. Not only your clients who are non html will be able to get your message, but ISPs also tend to put a better reputation when you have both in text and html.

7. Have consistency (aka dont kill your list)

Have you ever had a friend who can make you laugh at a drop of the hat? Sometimes, its great to be in the company of the person, but if you get it too often, sometimes you will wish that they will rest it for a while. Same concept should apply to your relationship with your list subscribers.

What we recommend: If your email is weekly, keep it weekly consistently. Never assume that you are too popular (ouch!) and start sending emails on a everyday basis. Remember, too much of a good thing can sometimes be bad.

8. Avoid rented list or emailing to those who did not give you permission to email them.

Always and always and ALWAYS email to people who explicitly grant you permission to email them. If they unsubscribe, let them go. Do not re-add their emails in unless they do so themselves. Also, avoid buying or adding any rented or bought list.

What we recommend: If you are adding or importing a list to Yezzar, please understand that we have a internal abuse system to track when an email campaign gets a out of ordinary abuse or marked as spam reports. When this happens, you can lose the access to the email list (or your account with us) temporarily or permanently depending on the severity of the situation.

9. Always analyze your emails.

Never assume that what worked last year, will still work now. You should always strive to improve your email campaign and adhere to best practices.

What we recommend: Keep an eye on the reporting tab and analyze all your subscriber actions, reports, opt outs, bounce rates to see what is working (or what not) in your email campaign.

10. Treat each of your subscribers like how you will treat someone close and dear to you.

Sometimes, the best way to get great email deliverability is to treat your subscribers just like how you will treat your grandpa, grandpa, neighbour, parents, friends etc !

What we recommend: At the end of the day, those people behind the numbers of your subscribers list are made of human. Treat them honorably, wisely and nicely.

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