Kickbox interviewed a bunch of us to find out what methods of opt-in we recommend. Go check it out.
What’s your favourite method of opt-in?
February 24, 2021
What’s the best opt-in method?
24February
October 24, 2017
Mailchimp changes signup process
24October
As of October 31, 2017 signup forms and popup boxes provided by Mailchimp will no longer default to a double / confirmed opt-in process. Starting October 31, single opt-in will become the default setting for all MailChimp hosted, embedded, and pop-up signup forms. This announcement was made earlier today in their newsletter and has been spreading like wildfire around the email community. Of...
July 6, 2017
Active buttons in the subject line
06July
This morning I waded into a twitter discussion with a bunch of folks about some issues they were having with delivery to gmail. The discussion started with a blog post at detailed.com describing how some senders are seeing significant drops in open rates. I thought I’d take a look and see if I can help, because, hey, this is an interesting problem. I signed up for a bunch of the mail that...
April 26, 2017
Every Download a Confirmation
26April
We often talk about confirmed opt-in (aka “closed-loop opt-in” or “double opt-in”) as the gold standard for address acquisition for permission-based mail. It’s not the only way to gather permission, and in some ways it’s a rather blunt tool that can discourage people from completing a sign-up process if it’s done badly – the confirmation email...
April 7, 2017
March 2017: The Month in Email
07April
It’s that time again… here’s a look at our last month of blog posts. We find it useful to recap each month, both to track trends and issues in email delivery and to provide a handy summary for those who aren’t following along breathlessly every single day. Let us know if you find it useful too! As always, I wrote about email filters. It’s so important to recognize that filters aren’t arbitrary...
March 27, 2017
Truth of Consequences
27March
“If you want to use another means that violates the law, and every common definition of “spam”, then by all means, go ahead. You can enjoy fines and being added to the ROKSO database,” says a comment on my recent COI blog post. It’s both disconcerting and entirely predictable. My post was a discussion of what to do with addresses that don’t confirm. Data tells us that...
February 28, 2017
Confirmed Opt-In: An Old Topic Resurrected
28February
Looking back through my archives it’s been about 4 years or so since I wrote about confirmed opt in. The last post was how COI wasn’t important, but making sure you were reaching the right person was important. Of course, I’ve also written about confirmed opt-in in general and how it was a tool somewhat akin to a sledgehammer. I’m inspired to write about it today because...
February 14, 2014
Using confirmation to get good email addresses
14February
For 25 hours the group De La Soul is releasing their entire catalog for free online. What none of the articles are mentioning is that they’re using this to build their database of email addresses in a way that’s going to result in a clean database of high value email addresses. How are they doing that? By making sure the addresses belong to their fans before they actually give fans...
July 8, 2013
A new twist on confirmation
08July
I got multiple copies of a request to “confirm my email address” recently. What’s interesting is the text surrounding the confirmation request. Hello, I have a list of potential customers in your area. The list includes several ways for you to contact them. I would like to send you a sample of this list to the address I have on file: spamtrap@example.com. Can you call me today...
April 16, 2013
Confirmation is too hard…
16April
One of the biggest arguments against confirmation is that it’s too hard and that there is too much drop off from subscribers. In other words, recipients don’t want to confirm because it’s too much work on their part. I don’t actually think it’s too much work for recipients. In fact, when a sender has something the recipient wants then they will confirm. A couple...
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