Deliverability | Main / Opt In Practices

It is generally accepted among the email receiving community (primarily ISPs and spam filters) that confirmed opt-in, also known as double opt-in, is the "gold standard". This means that before a person's email address is added to a mailing list, they must take some affirmative action beyond providing their email address. This can take the form of their replying to an email confirmation, clicking on a link contained in an email confirmation, or following a payment link (such as for a paid newsletter subscription) which has been emailed to them. The critical factor is that something has been emailed to the email address, and the holder of that email address has taken some affirmative step based on that email, to demonstrate both that they have control over that email address and that they wish to be added to the mailing list.

This helps to ensure that your email goes only to people who truly want it. This not only helps to reduce complaints, but is your best line of defense in the face of a spam complaint.

Recipient complaints often are the cause of ISP blacklisting - it’s that simple. The fact is, much of the blocking of permission-based email is due to customer complaints. Someone can complain or register your email as spam with the click of a mouse button, and when enough people do the same thing with your email, you can be blacklisted.

There is no published or agreed standard of how many complaints are necessary for an ISP to blacklist, so it varies quite widely. Some ISPs (and collaborative spam filter systems) will blacklist at a fraction of a percentage of complaints.

This gives you two problems: a negative image as a spammer, and a lack of ability to get through to customers who want your email. So how can you keep customer complaints to a minimum? By ensuring that your customers really wanted your email in the first place.