Whenever you're starting out on a new IP address, it's important to slowly and methodologically build a good sending reputation. The IP address is new and unused; it does not yet have a reputation of its own. ISPs are suspicious of mail from new, previously idle IP addresses, as they say that the vast majority of such connections is to attempt to delivery bad stuff, like spam or phishing messages. (Hotmail once told me that more than 80% of time, a new IP address connecting to them is trying to send them something bad.) So they're pretty touchy about that.

It's not that hard to deal with,...

My last post focused on offering engaging content and the all-important idea of testing. Today's tips revolve around managing your identity as it relates to ISPs as well as your subscribers:

Tip #7 - Authentication Continues to Factor in Delivery Decisions
Email authentication has become increasingly important over the past five years, and this emphasis will continue. Many marketers think of authentication as an anti-spoofing or anti-spam measure, but savvy marketers recognize the true value of authentication is that it allows ISPs to assign a reputation to a mail stream by accurately and...

At ExactTarget, client feedback plays a vital role in how we make decisions every day. So far in 2013, via our Client Success Surveys, we've listened to what clients have said about everything from our brand to our products to our teams. We make it a priority to share this valuable information across our organization, so we can take action and address suggestions.

• Are easy to do business with
• Care about our customers and partners
• Are...

This week, a handful of clients reached out to me and other members of the ExactTarget deliverability team, asking for our "official guidance" on Gmail's "new inbox." Truth is, I don't know that we can't provide anything official as of yet, as we're still digesting this change ourselves. I'm certain you'll hear more from us on this topic in the coming weeks and months.

In the meantime, here's what we can tell you.

Gmail doesn't seem to be enabling the new inbox by default. You have to click on the gear icon, and click "configure inbox" to enable this new functionality.

Mickey Chandler points out...

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.
 

Bendon Lingerie

Type: Promotional email
Send date: 5/8/13
Subject line: Something extra for you: buy any 2 items, get the 3rd free.

“Rather than seeing image blocking as an obstacle, this Australian lingerie retailer saw it as an opportunity to use a mosaic of color blocked table grids to send a simple heart-shaped message. While many marketers use mosaics to emulate the images-on creative, Bendon Lingerie chose not to be limited by that.”
—Kirk Barlow, Senior Deliverability &...

Our last post focused on managing customer conversations and preferences. Next up are #5 and #6 on our Deliverabilty Top 10 List:

Tip #5 - Offer Engaging Content, Not Just Marketing
Marketers who succedd are the ones who recognize that users remain in control when it comes to email. Mail streams that consist of nothing but marketing material are likely to fail, as they will experience high spam complaints and low user engagement. On the other hand, mail containing content that the recipient finds useful or desirable should do well as ISPs move to engagement models when making filtering...

The Gmail Team announced impending changes to their user interface today that will have an effect on users of their desktop and mobile platforms. The changes deal with how mail in the inbox is sorted for review by the recipient. These changes will be rolling out over the next several weeks for everyone, or you can opt-in to test things out now by selecting "Configure Inbox" after clicking on the gear icon.

Currently, default users of Gmail see mail which is sorted into "Important and unread" and "Everything else." In the future, though, the desktop will look like this (taken from the...

In the first part of our series on deliverability tips, we talked about increasing engagement and reducing list fatigue. Here's the second installment in our Deliverabilty Top 10 List:

Tip #3 - Make Client Communication a Two-Way Street
Currently, many marketers view client communication as a one-to-many process. For them, sending an email is like standing before a crowded auditorium and giving a speech, without the burden of having to stop from time to time for applause. Marketers who continue to engage in this method of communication will likely find themselves marginalized at best, or more...

What's the biggest challenge facing your email marketing?

If it's the quality of your email database, you're not alone. According to a new study by Econsultancy, 50% of surveyed marketers cited database quality as the biggest troublemaker in their email marketing strategies. Even more compelling, database quality has held that position three years running. So why is database quality such a big problem? 

Much like gourmet chefs working with spoiled ingredients, marketers working with outdated or unqualified databases have their chances at success handicapped from the start. If your database...

My colleages and I have dispensed a lot of deliverability tips on this blog throughout the years. But wouldn't it be nice to have the most useful nuggets of delivery-related wisdom compiled for easy reference? Well, your wish is our command.

Over the next few posts, we will, ahem, "deliver" the top ten tips to get your email campaigns to subscribers' inboxes in today's email ecosystem Let's start it off with the first two tips ...

Tip #1 - Subscriber Engagement Is Critical to Email Success
In years past, permission was seen as the key to having mail accepted. But we know things are changing. As...

Regardless of how long you’ve been using (or not using) a marketing automation tool, you should always be on the lookout for ways to improve your marketing efforts—whether it’s by implementing drip campaigns, exploring the wonders of dynamic content, or creating highly targeted email campaigns for specific audiences. The point is, there are always new and exciting things to try, especially with all of the extra time that you free up by implementing an automation system in the first place.

But how do you know what the next step is?

The best way to make sure that you’re always progressing...

When people talk about the basic elements of a successful email marketing campaign, there are a lot of facets to consider—responsive design, relevant messaging, personalization, pertinent send time, and beyond. But one facet of a successful email campaign that many marketers regrettably overlook is deliverability. After all, no matter how great the email, if it doesn’t reach the inbox, it can’t be effective.

Which brings us to Sky Angel.

Sky Angel came to ExactTarget in 2007 after experiencing deliverability issues sending emails from their internal servers. As a faith and family television...

Are you a digital marketer? Do you work for a travel brand? If you answered yes, then this blog post is for you!

ExactTarget recently released Reaching Today’s Digital Traveler, a compilation of tips and tactics that are critical for digital marketers in the travel and hospitality industry. Here’s the list of tactics, plus the questions you should ask yourself to keep your digital communication strategy on track.

1. Grow Your Subscriber list

To determine why your brand might be missing out on conversations with interested and ready-to-purchase travelers, ask yourself these questions:

• Do you...

If you’ve mastered marketing automation 101, and even tackled our 9 steps to go beyond the marketing automation basics, then you’re ready for a few of our expert tips. At this point, you should be delivering highly relevant and dynamic email content, sending out drip emails to nurture prospects over time, and managing your social profiles using real-time and scheduled posts.

Sound about right? If so, then read on to find out how you can continue to improve your marketing automation efforts with these 8 steps, inspired by the Mastering the Art of Marketing Automation eBook:

1. Don’t get lazy. At...

A client recently asked, "Are there any deliverability issues with using images hosted on third party CDN whose domain does not match the domain of the sender?"

If you're not aware, CDN means Content Delivery Network. A CDN is means of making your web pages and/or web applications load faster, by caching content on multiple servers, then requests for that content can be fulfilled by the nearest or most responsive available server. I might be oversimplifying it a bit, but in my personal experience with various CDNs, that's how they tend to work. Akamai might have been the first one-- they...

A useful update was posted today by Lili Crowley on AOL's postmaster blog indicating that they have recently tweaked their anti-spam filters. As a result, they will be issuing more CON:B1 errors for senders who exhibit "a spike in unfavorable e-mail statistics." (The CON:B1 error is defined by AOL here.) It certainly sounds like the filter change aims to increase their spam catch rate as it relates to a sender's reputation.

While mailbox providers like AOL routinely update their anti-spam defenses, it is uncommon for them to give notice to the email community of such a change. This official...

A friendly agency client of ours dropped the team a note today, explaining that when they reached out to Hotmail regarding a client's blocking issues, Hotmail's response included a recommendation that the sender enroll in the JRMP program. What is that, the client asked? Are we enrolled?

JMRP stands for "Junk Mail Reporting Program" and this is just the name Microsoft uses for their feedback loop mechanism. An ISP feedback loop, if you weren't already aware, is the mechanism by which an email is reported back to the sender (or the sender's email service provider) when an ISP user clicks the...

Nostalgia is fun. One need only look at BuzzFeed’s Rewind or Facebook groups celebrating the tenets of growing up in the ‘80s to notice the popular Internet trend of commemorating childhood favorites. It’s a rush of fond memories and “walking-uphill-both-ways” pride when we recall the objects and attitudes we prized in years gone by.

One piece of nostalgia that anyone with Internet in the ‘90s can remember is the hilarity and virality of those terrible ‘90s chain emails. These emails made their unwarranted way to the inboxes of early Internet users of all ages, and they defined the...

3sixty Live April meetings are coming to a city near you! 

• Connect professionally with the most innovative marketers in your area who also use the ExactTarget software
• Provide a place for sharing both strategies for marketing and ways of technically implementing them on the platform
• Connect directly with ExactTarget resources and people who can help you do your job better
• Innovate with...