Nett Knowledge Blog

In a recent blog post on email marketing someone asked about how to reduce and deal with complaints about spam, plus what his experience was

Once going through other posts on spam and complaints about spam, I didn't see any direct response fully addressing this problem, so have decided to do that here.

Let's have a look now

Problem: Getting Spam Complaints When You’re Not a Spammer

Below is what I noted from this blog post, along with the quotes I found from it:

•Got more complaints on spam than he would have liked.
•The emails were not promotional in nature. ("We're still a startup business and not even offering anything for sale. Our email marketing messages are short only a couple of paragraphs linking to a blog with freat content.
•Their subscribe database was all done online via double opt-in, so the subscribers really wanted his email and gave their permission... TWICE!
•The emails weekly (“so it’s hardly too much or too little that they forgot who we were”).
In short, it sounds like they're trying to do the right things.

So why on earth is this happening?

Spam Complaints Happen For Many Reasons

Well not all email has to be "spam" to still be repored as a spam complaint

Here are a few scenarios where complaints might occur (and what you might do to avoid them):

1.It’s easy to click “spam” – and not as easy to find the unsubscribe link.
Solution: make it easy to unsubscribe – consider putting an unsubscribe link near the top of your email.

2.Some people in the past who have clicked on unsubscribe haven't been unsubscribed, or worse they've unsubscribed and secretly been put on other lists, so they don't trust clickng on unsubscribe, or have heard not to do it.

Work Around: Ensure people know they subscribed to your email... Do this by having a date and time, and even a URL signature of where they signed up in each of your emails, this really helps, you might also have a descriptive title such as "Your Name - YourWebsite.com - Your Email Subject!" this works very well also and is highly recommended.

3.The email was requested but not relevant.

Work Around: Ensure that your emails really address what your subscribers want and need. Be sure to track what the specific response is from your emails so you can create more targeted and relevant email marketing campaigns.

4.The timing was out on when the subscriber expected your next email to arrive (maybe becuase when they subscribed, they didn't read or even see, how frequently email messages would be sent).

Solution: set expectations clearly when subscribers opt in. Tell them what they’re going to get, when they’re going to get it and who it’ll be coming from.

5.The subscriber didn’t like something about the email – or something else about the company sending it (“I had a bad experience on Company X’s website/in Company X’s store, so now I’m marking their email as spam.”).

Solution: request feedback from prospects and customers. Find out what they do and don’t like about your emails – and your business as a whole. Customer service, product selection, pricing, policies, everything… they can all affect subscriber perception of your company. Then take that feedback and improve.There are certainly other possible reasons for spam complaints, and other courses of action that you might take, but by addressing these areas of your email marketing, you can reduce your exposure to spam complaints and maximize your email deliverability.

What Have You Done To Reduce Spam Complaints?

Have you thought about directly addresssing the source of the complaints? Have you experienced other complaints? What's been useful and effective in your fight against spam?

You're welcome to leave your thoughts and experiences below!