Al has a guest post up from an ISP rep (now universally referred to as Barry) about senders contacting ISPs. It lists things senders do that Barry Don’t Like.
Listen to Barry.
There are also comments from various other Barrys in the comments. Those are worth reading, too.
When I posted my initial cut of the ISP information page earlier this year, there was a comment asking about a Verizon FBL. At that time, I talked to some of the people-who-would-know over at Verizon and asked if they do have a FBL. The answer was a definite no.
For some reason, though, I continue to receive questions about the Verizon FBL. Based on the questions, the best I can extrapolate is that there is an ESP out there, somewhere, that states they have a Verizon FBL. It is possible, albeit unlikely, that they have a special agreement with Verizon. However, there is no generally available Verizon FBL.
If Verizon does make a FBL widely available, I will mention it here and update the ISP information page with the data. Until then, be very cautious with claims that there is a Verizon FBL.
One of the more challenging things I do is work with companies who have poor reputations that they’re trying to repair. These companies have been getting by with poor practices for a while, but finally the daily delivery falls below their pain threshold and they decide they need to fix things.
That’s when they call me in, usually asking me if I can go to the ISPs and tell the ISPs that they’re not spammers, they’re doing everything right and will the ISP please stop unfairly blocking them. Usually I will agree to talk to the ISPs, if fixing the underlying problems doesn’t improve their delivery on its own. But before we can talk to the ISPs, we have to try to fix things and at least have some visible changes in behavior to take to them. Once they have externally visible changes, then we can ask the ISPs for a little slack.
With these clients there isn’t just one thing they’ve done to create their bad reputation. Often nothing they’re doing is really evil, it’s just a combination of sorta-bad practices that makes their overall reputation really bad. The struggle is fixing the reputation requires more than one change and no single change is going to necessarily make an immediate improvement on their reputation.
This is a struggle for the customer, because they have to start thinking about email differently. Things have to be done differently from how they’ve always been done. This is a struggle for me because I can’t guarantee if they do this one thing that it will have improved delivery. I can’t guarantee that any one thing will fix their delivery, because ISPs measure and weight dozens of things as part of their delivery making decisions. But what I can guarantee is that if they make the small improvements I recommend then their overall reputation and delivery will improve.
What small improvement have you made today?
What is the secret to dealing with ISPs?
The short answer is: Don’t do it if at all possible. Talking to ISP reps generally isn’t going to magically improve your reptuation. There is no place in the reputation systems where delivery can be modified because the delivery specialist knows or is liked by the postmaster at an ISP.
With my clients, I work through delivery issues and can solve 80 – 90% of the issues without ever having to contact anyone at the ISPs. 90% of the remaining issues can be handled using the publicly available contacts and websites provided by the ISPs.
In the remaining cases, the “secret” to getting useful and prompt replies is to: