It seems like the volume of email spam has doubled in the last month. Increasingly, we receive daily emails for better mortgage rates, pharmaceutical discounts, and offers to enlarge body parts we don’t even have.

The next generation of sophisticated tools is available to email spammers. Hidden code can be embedded into email allowing the sender to track it. A “spam beacon” lets the sender know that this is a valid, live, email address. The sender can also tell if you’ve opened the email before you tossed it. “Nearly half of all spam is bugged with so-called "spam beacons" for tracking users who open junk mail, said e-mail filtering firm MX.”

The latest email scams have also evolved. The newest scams are called phishing attacks. Spammers copy and paste web coding, making their email message appear to be official. They provide links to “look alike” websites where they try to trick you into revealing your personal financial information, by asking you to update an account such as Ebay, PayPal or CitiBank (or other well known entities). Phishing attacks are successful 5% of the time.

The primary motivation behind these emails is identity theft. Scammers are looking to get you to their website and get your information. If the authenticity of the sender is questionable, call the company that sent the email. Most business email will also contain a phone number.

Earthlink is trying to address this problem by releasing new software. Its latest anti-spam software is available to both members and non-members. The software installs with Internet Explorer and automatically downloads a list of known “scam” websites. If you surf over to a site on the list, you will receive a warning.

Given the large volume of unsolicited email that must be sorted through and deleted daily by businesses, do not rely on email as your primary vehicle of communication. If the information is time sensitive, it’s best to follow up with a phone call.

About The Author

MARKETING COORDINATOR and WEBSITE DESIGNER-Radha Khalsa, has extensive experience in the areas of marketing analysis, strategic planning and project management.

info@khalsaweb.com

Below is a letter I wrote to the following organizations:

S.H.U. (Spam-Haters Unanimous)

N.A.A.P.W.H.S. (National Association for the Advancement of People Who Hate Spam)

P.W.H.P.W.D.H.S. (People Who Hate People Who Don’t Hate Spam)

P.F.W.S.H.I.A.L.C. (People for Whom Spam-Hating is a Lifestyle Choice)

S.A.P.W.R.R.R.H.S. (Society for the Advancement of People Who Really Really Really Hate Spam)

P.W.H.S.S.M.I.M.L.W.S.C.O.T.E. (People Who Hate Spam So Much It Makes Little Wisps of Steam Come Out of Their Ears)

And, of course: Spam Haters In The Business of Internet Resource Directory Services.

DEAR FELLOW SPAM HATERS,

I’m writing to suggest that we combine forces in order to present a common front in our righteous war on unsolicited commercial email:

Spam!

I suggest we disband the myriad sites and organizations now opposing unsolicited commercial email in order to form a single, unified organization:

The Spammish Inquisition!

And I further suggest we elect me, Linda Cox, as our leader. Our Grand Inquisatrix!

WHAT ARE MY QUALIFICATIONS?

You think YOU hate spam? You don’t even know what hate is!

I hate spam so much that I… well, just a LOT! That’s how much!

If I hated spam any more than I already do, I think my head would burst into flames and spin like a top! Can you say that?

Don’t think so.

I don’t mean to say that I don’t hate other things too, like pedophiles and nazis and that drunk guy who backed over my cat when I was seven.

But spam… hooboy!

SQUISH ‘EM LIKE BUGS!

I believe we should have a constitutional amendment allowing cruel and unusual punishment in the case of spammers. Maybe that tummy thing like the Japanese do when they get depressed.

As with drugs, mere possession of bulk emailing software should result in the immediate confiscation of the computer it was on, as well as any nice clothes, jewelry, or lawn statuary that might have been purchased with spam profits.

Just thinking about sending spam should be illegal, like joking about bombs in an airport. If I get to be Grand Inquisatrix, I’ll have my own force of men-in-black dudes to sniff out spamsters and be really mean to them and call them names until they promise to be good little netizens again.

It’s for their own good.

IN CLOSING…

Having looked at the websites of some of the anti-spam crusaders, I know that I am not alone in my revulsion, disgust and utter skin-crawling contempt for spam.

Like them, I have turned a blind-eye to more mundane problems like hunger, illiteracy, disease, country music and poverty so as to focus on the true menace ravaging our cyber-society.

If you wish to support my crusade, you may do so by sending me $99, and as a free gift I’ll send you a CD with the email addresses of 40 million netizens eagerly awaiting news of your latest product or service.

Linda Cox, G.I.W. (Grand Inquisatrix Wannabe)

P.S. Oh yeah… stale croutons. Hate ‘em.

About The Author

Linda Cox (J.A.M.G.) was born in a speeding stagecoach amid the screams of fellow passengers as insane, wild-eyed horses dragged them all crashing toward the brink of destruction. That stagecoach was the planet Earth, those passengers were the human race, and Linda Cox is Just Another Marketing Guru. (The horses were just regular horses.) http://www.LindaCox.com/

Junk mail works. Why does it work? How does it work?

These are very important questions.

To make it work, it has to appeal to the emotions. They have to make claims that inspire you to click on that ‘yes’ button. They inspire you with tales of what you could do with all that extra money. Clear all your debts. Pay off your mortgage. Take the family on a trip to Disney land. All this would be possible if only you would press that button.

What they are doing is creating images in your minds. Images of a new lifestyle. Visions of relaxing on a tropical beach. Cruises on a luxury ocean liner. Explaining to your employer exactly where to put his job.

This is selling the image. Not the product. Selling the fantasy. And it only cost $.xx.xx

Study these adverts. Try to discover how they work. What is it in them that makes you want to click that yes button. Find one that intrigues you. One that makes you want to click that button. What is it that convinced you that this one is the one that you have been looking for. Break it down into it’s component parts. Can you use this in your own adverts?

These adverts must be good for them to stay in business. What do they have that yours don’t. Study them. Look at the words that they use. Look at the way that they use them.

Use this knowledge to spice up your ad‘s. If it works for them, it can work for you.

You don‘t have to Spam. Use their expertise to run a legitimate business.

If you have a Spam blocker, sign up to a separate e-mail account and send out an advert to a free list. You will have enough unsolicited e-mail to keep you going for months.

Use their expertise to your advantage.

Good luck and keep learning. That is the only way to stay on top. If you feel that you have nothing more to learn, You are in for a surprise. When you stop learning, you stop winning. Let’s face it, the whole idea is to win, and keep on winning.

Good luck. …Bob……

Robert has been on line for over four years and earns a very good living from some of the very best affiliate programs on the web. This is one of his favorites. If you are interested in growing your very own opt-in mailing list in the shortest possible time, take a look now.

http://www.bz9.com/robjfar ‘It’s free.’

What’s the big deal? All you read on the internet is spam, spam, spam. Spam protection this, spam protection that. Oh my God! Be careful don’t let any one see your SACRED email address! I read they even put a spammer in jail. What kind of a barbaric country would do that? Now I am not a spammer. I don’t know how to send spam. If I did I would!

I am not afraid of placing my email address to the ends of the earth. I look forward to my spam everyday! If spam comes that I have no interest in. You know what…I HAVE GOT a DELETE button all free provided by Yahoo! And it works perfect!!!

However, I am getting very annoyed with Yahoo.

Why?

Because I hold the World’s Record of the most girlfriends of any man on the planet. Needless to say I can’t see every girl every day. So I email them my Casanova love letters! When I try to send my love letters to my darlings. I usually send 50 at a time. That’s all my old computer can stand. Yahoo puts characters in my face before I can send letters to my girlfriends. Add insult to injury now Yahoo says I can only send 50 emails per hour. Put your calculator to work and see how many hours it will take me to send my dolls a love letter, after all, I have over 1000 active 18 to 22 year old dream girlfriends and I am 55 years old man! And believe me my girls are waiting by their computers for my romantic love letters!

I am looking for a sidekick who loves girls. Preferably a rich buddy who loves girls. As I am running low on cash. Who would’nt with over 1000 girls!!! Any great spammers out there who know how to spam. Maybe you can help me find my rich sidekick who loves girls! Let’s spam him!

Thank you very much…

Please feel free to publish this article and resource box in your ezine, newsletter, offline publication or website. I also ask that you activate any html links found in the article and in the byline. You may make minor editorial corrections only. A copy would be appreciated at seniorplayboy1@yahoo.co

Elvis Preston King was born in Mississippi and grew up in Memphis. Not to be confused with the other great King, Elvis Presley. Elvis has always had an eye for girls since he first saw one as a baby. Elvis is a 55 year old senior who doesn’t want to let go of being 18. He has over 1000 sexy girlfriends 18 to 22 years old. He is now looking for just ONE gentleman sidekick to share in his good fortune. His office is based out of Los Angeles, Ca.

You can email him at loverboybachelor@yahoo.com or visit http://bachelortours.blogspot.com/ and http:http://www.msnusers.com/BachelorDreamTours

If you’ve been around the interenet any length of time then you probably know what spam is. However, if you’re new to the internet you might be asking yourself the question "What is Spam?"

The best place to begin would be to explain to you exactly what spam mail is. Spam is basically just unsolicited commercial emails that companies send to your inbox.

There are a lot of ways these companies get your email address. You may have signed up for a newsletter or promotions with one of them, or you may have ordered a product or service that requires registration from a website first.

It is common for companies to share their mailing lists with their affiliate companies. It’s one of the benefits to having affiliations. The only problem is that most companies hide this knowledge in their “terms and agreements” of their websites. They count on the fact that most people do not read all the way through them. Of course since it is mentioned somewhere in their website, it is perfectly legal.

The average person can expect to receive anywhere from ten to twenty spam’s a day in their inbox; depending on how many promos and registrations they fill out. Once a person accepts or opens an unsolicited email, they become plagued by receiving six more in its place. It is a vicious cycle.

As the internet has reached its peak popularity during the past couple of years, so have companies followed suit and expanded their abilities to advertise. The biggest problem is that they don’t know when to stop advertising.

The best place to begin with this manual is to give you a list of some of the things that you may do that will leave your inbox vulnerable to receiving spam.

• Filling out a registration for an online newsletter is a common way for companies to use your inbox to advertise.

• Registering your inbox for promos and contests.

• When installing new software it is common to register your email address for updates, but it is also leaving yourself open to spam.

• Signing yourself up for just about anything online is leaving yourself open to receiving spam.

• Reviewing books online generally requires that you provide your email address.

One Common factor in all of these things listed is that you have to volunteer your email address to a company before it can be used. Of course, there are ways for a company to get your email address without you having to give it to them directly.

Lewis Leake is the webmaster of eMailCash.com. There you will find articles, resources, books and product reviews on eMail Marketing Strategies and Tactics. You will also find a number of articles on SPAM and how to prevent it. Get Your FREE Mini-Report Spam and It’s Consequences!

Spam is annoying. Period. Why people would want to send all of us stupid messages about buying prescription drugs or getting some outrageously good mortgage rate is beyond me. Well, not really.

You might ignore those emails. But not everyone does. And that’s why they’re sent. Emails cost so little (or nothing) to send. So sending out a million of them could be a cakewalk. Let’s say one out of every 1,000 recipients falls for their ploy. Someone just got 1,000 new customers! How in the heck did those spammers get your address in the first place? Well, they actually use a variety of techniques. They use programs called spambots to search the web and pick up any email addresses that could be listed on websites. They use what’s called the "Dictionary" technique, where they take a well-known email extension (earthlink.net, for instance), and make up all kinds of possible user names to go with it. For example, with me they could try the usernames "kara", "kara1", "kara2" and so on, until they can confirm one of those connected to an earthlink.net extension is a valid email address. Kinda like going page by page through the dictionary.

Ever fill out a registration form on a website and find a little checkbox, probably near the bottom, asking if you want to receive additional information, newsletters, or something of that nature? Often the box is checked, and in order NOT to receive the info, you have to UNCHECK it (or else). Well if you miss those types of boxes on the wrong kinds of sites, your email addresses may be handed to spammers on a silver platter. Well, almost. Often a zillion email addresses are sold for next to nothing to spammers on CDs. (Couldn’t you almost call those silver platters?) Many internet service providers (those guys that keep you connected to the internet so you can send and receive email) use a variety of methods to block spam before it ever gets to you. Nevertheless, we all know that some spam inevitably gets through to our inboxes. That’s when we need to take a proactive stance and install some sort of software to filter it out!

© 2005 by Kara Glover

Feel free to reprint this article in newsletters and on websites, with resource box included. If you use this article, please send a brief message to let me know where it appeared: kara333@earthlink.net

For help on installing anti-spam software, check out this article on Kara Glover’s website: http://www.karathecomputertutor.com You can also find more articles, tips and tutorials on topics such as Microsoft Word., Excel, and PowerPoint there. Kara is a Computer Tutor and Troubleshooter.

Spam can be a lot more damaging than you might think. Obviously, they are the most annoying thing that you can receive through your inbox, but it goes deeper than that. If you are like the millions of other internet email users, you know that sending and receiving email is a free service that comes with your internet service.

Internet service providers are great for providing you with a way to send letters to your friends and family while saving you the cost of postage and envelopes. You can even send cards for free with an email address. But don’t let the free service make you think that you don’t actually have to pay for it. Let me explain.

Internet service providers and web hosts do not get their email services for free. They have to pay for something that we do not have to pay for as consumers. They have to pay for bandwidth. That might not mean much to you, but for these companies, it means that they are forced to produce mass emails, and this means that their costs increase as well.

It may not seem to be a matter for the mere consumer, but let me tell you that this does affect you; here is how:

Since they are forced to send mass emails, which in turn raise their costs for service, you as the receiver are forced to pay more money for you internet service. This in a way helps ISP’s to reduce their overhead costs.

Some of the cheaper ISPs like Net Zero help to cut their costs down by charging outside companies money to spam and add those annoying pop-ups to your homepages. Since the advertisers are paying for their pop-ups, you get a break on the cost of using them as an ISP.

Other popular companies use affiliations to assist them with keeping their costs down, eventually leaving the consumer with a pretty good rate. I’d prefer to use an ISP that simply goes for the search engine affiliation as they have much better pop-up prevention on their side, and they actually provide you with a service.

Chris Hickman owns a site with the best advice about how to stop spam free. Check Out his site at http://www.how-to-stop-spam-free.com

A friend of mine received a chilling email message from his ISP the other day. Someone had reported him as sending SPAM and the ISP warned that an additional SPAM complaint would result in losing his hosting service - period. No ifs, ands or buts!

The ISP just took the word of the person filing the complaint as gospel, even though my friend had the email subscription notification where this person, or someone posing as them, had subscribed.

My friend sent me a copy of the subscription notification. And sure enough, there it was as plain as day… it contained the date, time and the subscription IP address of the person making the Spam allegation. Unfortunately, all this evidence fell on deaf ISP ears.

This little incident firms my conviction that a federal CAN- SPAM law might not be a bad idea after all. Without it, persons alleging Spam, like the one above, may be able to sue under State law. And that’s where the nightmare begins…

Oh sure, the person will most likely end up losing the case but here’s the typical situation. The "injured party" files a lawsuit and the ISP immediately shuts off service to the publisher. And guess what, the publisher is immediately out of business even though she/he is sitting there with evidence that the allegation is totally groundless. Talk about scary! And if you think this scenario can’t happen to you - think again.

The erroneous reporting of Spam has become wide-spread and has gotten even easier. Don’t like a company or their products? Just accuse them of spam. Do it a couple of times in one week and, guess what, they’re off line - period.

AOL and Yahoo owners can simply click a button and report anything they feel like as Spam - with no consequence whatsoever if the allegation is totally baseless. The "This is Spam button" has replaced the delete key as "the" answer for some folks. And I’ll bet you’d have a hard time tracking down whomever made the initial AOL or Yahoo Spam complaint as well.

Time to Get Tough

There are several proactive steps you can take to protect yourself against baseless Spam allegations. Admittedly, there is nothing you can do to stop someone bound and determined to damage your reputation and business if they have a mind to do so. You can, however, certainly minimize the risk of this happening to you. But you do have to be proactive.

I recommend that you add a legal notice to your subscription Thank You page and also to every ezine newsletter issue that you send out. Something along the lines of the following…

"The subscriber agrees, by accepting this email newsletter subscription, to indemnify the publisher against false accusations of spam to include, but not limited to, payment of all damages, loss of web hosting fees and services, all damages for loss of business and goodwill, and any and all fees or fines that may be imposed against the publisher by any federal, state, local authority or civilian business entity as a result of the false spam accusation."

Add the paragraph above, or something similar, just above your ezine unsubscribe link.

The reason I think this is a powerful solution is because it establishes a contract between the publisher and the subscriber. And contract law is pretty much the same in all jurisdictions when it comes to breach of contract.

Please note that what I have provided you is for guidance and informational purposes only and should not be construed as practicing law. Do check with your local attorney to make sure that this statement will suffice in your jurisdiction. But I think you get the idea.

Is this concept new? Hardly, jl Scott of the iCOP organization thought of this over two years ago. Will it scare some of your subscribers off? You bet it will. But guess what…

The people it scares off are exactly the people you DON’T want on your list anyway. They most likely have the itchy moronic fingers or the "I’ve had a bad day let’s accuse someone of Spam and get them shut down" folks that you don’t want to have anything do to with anyway.

Listen, perhaps it’s just me, but I wouldn’t be fazed in the least if I saw such a caveat on an ezine I really wanted to sign up for. Would you? I only want people on my list who are responsible and willing to accept the consequences of their actions. People who, if they mistakenly accuse me of Spam and got my business erroneously shut down, would face up to their responsibility and pay for the damage they caused. I don’t want a Spam Nazi on my list who is too lazy to hit the delete key. No thanks!

Rough? Yes, but that’s the reality of doing business on the Internet today.

Other Options Available

Paul Hancox of UpYourMarketing.com has just released a brilliant report that outlines several other steps any prudent publisher online should take to protect themselves and their online business. It’s called "The ePublishers Survival Kit - How to Minimize Spam Complaints and Defend Yourself Against False Spam Accusations."

http://www.writersnest.com/spampro.zip

The report is in pdf format so MAC and WIN users alike can access the information. Combine these recommendations with those in Paul’s report and you’ll pretty much be covered.

Final thoughts. I don’t have to remind you of how hard you worked to build your online business. Protect yourself and minimize the risk of having it suddenly shut down by following the recommendations here and in Paul’s free report.

While you can’t stop malicious Spam complaints 100%, taking proactive steps now can go a long way to making sure your business remains safe and viable. Believe me, that’ll make you sleep much better at night!

About The Author

Malacka - Copyright 2003

http://www.writersnest.com

Stuff that Really Works to Make You Money Online!

http://www.hot-matches.com

http://www.dog-training-at-home.com

Feel free to distribute this article so long as it remains unedited and the resource box is included.

Do you like spam? No, I’m not kidding. Everybody knows what spam is, almost everybody seems to have learned by heart simple advice like "do not click …" "do not respond…" , "do not buy…" but–

On March 23, 2005 Mirapoint and the Radicati Group, a consulting and market research firm, released preliminary results of their end-user survey on email hygiene. "This preliminary data is surprising and somewhat shocking to us," said Marcel Nienhuis, market analyst at the Radicati Group.

The survey shows that some end users haven’t learned the lesson and still make the same blunders.

Blunder 1 — clicking on embedded links within spam (not including the unsubscribe link) — 31% of respondents have done it at least once. The most dangerous mistake.

Clicking on any embedded links in spam messages helps spammers determine ‘live’ email accounts, which means more spam. What’s worse, users can pick viruses, Trojans or other malicious code–just by clicking on embedded links. It may cause various problems, including loss of confidential information–identity theft, and loss of money from bank accounts as a result.

Users shouldn’t forget about such threat as phishing. Not long ago, on February. 15, 2005, it was the Radicati Group that pointed out –fraud and phishing types of email are one of the fastest growing segments of spam. In the first quarter of 2005 the Radicati Group expects fraudulent emails to reach 8% of all spam.

Blunder 2 — trying to unsubscribe to spam using the ‘unsubscribe’ link in the email — 18% of respondents

Some users are naive enough to think that spammers really won’t send any junk mail to their addresses if they tell them not to. Haven’t they heard that spammers use the unsubscribe link solely to identify active email accounts. When individual email addresses or entire domains are found to be active, they are doomed to flood of spam.

Blunder 3 — What’s more: Over 10% of respondents have purchased products advertised in spam. Sending out huge volumes of spam is very cheap, so let’s face it–spam is an effective means of advertising. Spam is booming, and these 10% users who actually bought anything advertised by spam, are partly to blame for it.

The consequences can be very serious when such a user is at work. Online criminals find more and more ways of stealing valuable information, some of these techniques include spam. Spam filters won’t solve the whole problem; much still depends on end users. Marcel Nienhuis, analyst from the Radicati Group, was absolutely right when said " no technology in the world can protect an organisation if users’ exercise bad email behaviour."

Alexandra Gamanenko currently works at Raytown Corporation, LLC—an independent software developing company. This company provides software capable of disabling information-stealing modules, which can be hidden inside spyware as well as viruses, worms and Trojans. Learn more — visit the company’s website http://www.anti-keyloggers.com

One of our Australian clients sent out a campaign using a list which had been complied manually.

The message contained information relevant for the specific job position that these recipients held. It had the sender’s details, a functional (and automated) unsubscribe link, real "from" and "reply" addresses and manual unsubscribes were actioned and replied to immediately. It was personalised with name, Company and position.

Did they have express consent from the recipient? No.

Was it Spam? No

According to the Australian Spam Act 2003, our client was able to send these targeted recipients information relevant to their positions. This is what is referred as "Inferred Consent".

However, even though the campaign was entirely in accordance with the legislation, many of the recipients responded with "This is Spam" replies.

What went wrong? Nothing….other than readers expectations.

Australian, American and European readers expect a simplified solution to the current Spam problem. Hence, when the relevant legislations came into being in each country, the readers immediately (and wrongly) thought that any communications sent to them other than what had been specifically requested must be Spam. Similar to the Australian Legislation (Spam ACT 2003), the USA (CAN Spam ACT) and the EU Anti-Spam Legislation, provide avenues for businesses to conduct legitimate marketing campaigns to corporates (as opposed to the general public). So, rather than asking the obvious question, such as: Is this the end of all direct marketing email campaigns? I believe we should be asking: How can we educate the public?

Readers need to be educated on the difference between permission and non-permission email. It seems that the once starkly obvious line between permission-based emails and Spam is fading in our readers minds, causing endless problems for emailers - not only the obvious problems such as blacklisting, but other more insidious problems such as ROI and maintaining clean lists.

Most of the causes of the publics distrust are of course, rightly attributed to Spammers - real Spammers.

Consumers have been told repeatedly not to reply to, or unsubscribe from, Spam, for fear of confirming that their address is "real" and therefore being added to Spam lists. This thought, in turn has encompassed anything that hinted at a whiff of Spam, with no consideration for permission-based email.

These are the readers who press their "this is Spam" button at anything doubtful or unwanted without a second’s hesitation. They are also the reason for the growing amount of unopened email rates, as they are finding it easier to simply delete and report instead of unsubscribing to a newsletter they once signed up for. One such filtering program that is enabling the reader to do this is Mailwasher.

For the average email user, Mailwasher is an easy to use program to filter out Spam emails from legitimate emails. Unfortunately, it is also perfect for filtering your unwanted emails as well - emails that the reader once was interested in receiving, but now is not. With a click of the mouse, the once requested email is deleted on the server (i.e. it does not get recorded as being opened in your statistics), bounced (this is why your bounce rates are growing and your open rates are declining) AND reported to SpamCop - all with one click and 1 second of deliberation (or less). What’s more, Mailwasher is free. I thoroughly recommend you download a copy and see for yourself how easy it is for your readers to blacklist you: www.mailwasher.net.

Some things you can do to minimise complaints:

1. Have a complaint system in place

This should be preferably manned by a person, not automated, so the complainant knows that you are taking them seriously. A reply ideally needs to be done in the same day as the complaint, and it needs to be positive rather than negative in tone. Be understanding, whilst clarifying that you have followed the legislative requirements and assure them that they will receive no further email communications from your company. THEN IMMEDIATELY, unsubscribe them from your database.

2. Have as much personalisation within the email as possible.

True Spammers don’t have actual lists of email addresses. They create lists using dictionary attacks. Once they have emailed the list created using the above method, they pull the bounces, and then reuse the "good" addresses. Because of this, they are not able to personalise the emails at all, hence servers and personalise filters are set to stop any emails which do not include any personalisation. Therefore personalisation helps on 3 main levels:

• Helps to get through the filters and actually arrive in the recipient’s mailbox.

• Helps the recipient to identify that is not Spam as it is addressed to themselves in various ways.

• The more personalising of the email the better - not only in name, company, position, member number etc but also in tailoring content to suit the person therefore reducing the likelihood of the recipient growing tired of receiving your communications.

3. The readers must be educated.

This will only happen in time - and only from using a combination of good emailing etiquette will they be assured that it is safe to unsubscribe from a newsletter they no longer want rather than delete and report. Most people that call you a spammer do so because they don’t know the legislation. We, as marketers need to be aware of the need of educating our readers.

4. Automate the unsubscribe method.

Why do readers delete/bounce/report when tired of receiving the email instead of unsubscribing? Because it’s easy. So, make it as easy as possible for your recipient to unsubscribe. It’s a mistake to try and keep them on your list by means of a complicated unsubscribe method. You want a clean list -you only want people on your list who are potential buyers etc. By having a clean list you are better able to: deliver accurate reports, market research -understand what your customers are wanting and reduce the risk of being reported as a spammer and being blacklisted.

5. Inform them how you received their information.

Be open with them. The more you hide, the more you will look like a spammer in their eyes.

Don’t be discouraged. As with all things, the more learned we (and our clients) become with regards to the Spam legislature, the easier it will be to conduct successful email marketing campaigns. The more marketers comply with the legislature, the more responsive our readers will be as well as learning to distinguish between Spam and genuine email marketing.

Kath Pay is Marketing Director of Ezemail, a web-based e-communications tool, which enables you to create, send and track your email marketing and SMS messaging campaigns. For more information please go to http://www.ezemail.com or contact Kath at: kath@ezemail.com