Word to the Wise helps email marketers create more effective email messages, programs and infrastructures. We advise you how to skillfully navigate the constant business, technology, and policy challenges so your messages reach your customers.
We can help you with your email strategy, deliverability challenges and many other email issues.
The FTC (US Federal Trade Commission) is soliciting comments on CAN-SPAM legislation: A. General Issues 1. Is there a continuing need for the Rule? Why or why not? 2. What benefits has the Rule provided to consumers? What evidence supports the asserted benefits? 3. What modifications, if any, should be made to the Rule to increase its benefits to consumers? (a) What evidence supports the proposed...
Most companies and senders will tell you they follow all the best practices. My experience says they follow the easy best practices. They’ll comply with technical best practices, they’ll tick all the boxes for content and formatting, they’ll make a nod to permission. Then they’re surprised that their mail delivery isn’t great. Too many senders, ESPs and...
Not a new thing, but a nice example just popped up in my inbox on my phone. But FedEx solved their entire phishing problem when they published a strict p=reject DMARC record, right? This didn’t come from fedex.com. It came from another domain that looks vaguely like fedex.com – what that domain is doesn’t matter, as the domain it’s sent from isn’t displayed to...
Monday I published a blog post about the ongoing B2B spam and how annoying it is. I get so many of these they’re becoming an actual problem. 3, 4, 5 a day. And then there’s the ongoing “drip” messages at 4, 6, 8, 12 days. It is getting out of control. It’s spam. It’s annoying. And most of it’s breaking the law. But, I can also use it as blog (and twitter...
I’ve been increasingly annoyed by these drip automation campaigns. You know the ones I mean. Senders use some software to find some flimsy pretext to send a mail. Then there emails drop every few days. Sometimes this cycle goes on for months. Most of these messages violate CAN SPAM. It’s annoying. It’s illegal. It is spam. I can even opt out of most of these messages, they...
AOL were kind enough to share some details about the shutdown of the Verizon mail system and the migration of @verizon.net email address to the AOL mail service: What is the cut-over date for the verizon.net MX record? The cut-over date for the mx record for verizon.net to to be handled by AOL is June 20, 2017. This will occur after midnight sometime on Tuesday morning June 20 EDT. How...
Today the Canadian Government announced they were suspending the provision that allows individuals to sue marketers for violations of CASL. Under these provisions, individual Canadian consumers had a private right of action. Any Canadian could sue any company that sent mail violating the law. This part of the law upset many senders and marketers. I’m sure many are relieved at this delay in...
A little over a year ago, Kristin Bond posted an article (reprinted here) looking at the diversity of speakers at marketing conferences. As with many articles pointing out gender issues in technology there was quite a bit of discussion about it on a related mailing list. Some of the comments were supportive and open to the idea that gender diversity is an overall good. Some of the comments...
On May 31, British broadband provider EE discontinued service for a number of email domains: Orange.net, Orangehome.co.uk, Wanadoo.co.uk, Freeserve.co.uk, Fsbusiness.co.uk, Fslife.co.uk, Fsmail.net, Fsworld.co.uk, and Fsnet.co.uk. These domains were acquired by EE as part of multiple mergers and acquisitions. On their help page, EE explains that the proliferation of free email services with...
A few months ago a colleague sent me, and every other person on his overly large LinkedIn list, an email looking for some help hiring. It starts off with “Greetings LinkedI Connections” and ends with… an unsubscribe link. P.S. If you don’t want to hear from me, here’s an unsubscribe link – that’s the easiest way. My LinkedIn network has gotten so...
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