Our Quarterly Review Service

Note: This service is for professional, reputable, and established e-marketers only - see footnote

Millions of people visit their doctor each year for their annual physical. Why? Because they want to make sure there are no problems with their health and a doctor is the best person to give the physical. The same type of analysis holds true for your e-mail marketing campaigns. You need to know from a trusted outside source that your mailings are clean, your delivery through the major anti-spam systems are smooth, your message itself does not contain any URL's which trip the filters at the major mail gateways, and your mailing practices are following best practices.

Our quarterly review service will do this and much, much more.

This is NOT a Deliverability Monitoring Service. There are many companies that will monitor for you where a message landed on a destination domain, how long it took to get there, and why the message did not arrive. Those are great services and every company involved in e-mail marketing should be using one of those services. Please contact us if you need to find a good delivery monitoring service - we will point you to some of the best. The services we provide go far beyond monitoring. We go into the nuts and bolts of your mailing, your e-mail vendor, your network itself, and then we work with the anti-spam appliance maker or filter owner to resolve the problem for you.

Step 1 - Uncovering the Problem

We will analyze your message from top to bottom, evaluate your message as it passes through the major anti-spam gateways and appliances, and will test the message header, content, and IP addresses you are sending from for signs of problems. We will test your opt-in, opt-out, and complaint loop. We will analyze the newsgroup "chatter" that is going on about you and your current ESP to uncover subtle problems which may be causing filters. In short, we will give the "mother of all physicals" to you, your message, and your mailing practices to shake loose any problems.

This will be done without any bias towards your current E-Mail Service Provider (ESP). Yes, we are also an ESP but our quarterly review focuses solely on you and your message and how it passes through the Internet. If we find a problem we will alert you so you can bring that to the attention of your current ESP. Many ESP's are simply "too big" to have the time to really dig into the details of your mailings and that can often mean a content filter or anti-spam filter is being hit, repeatedly, without you ever knowing. You will always hit some type of content filter in your e-mail marketing but how widespread is that filter? We will tell you.

Step 2 - Fixing the Problem

Finding the problem is easy but getting that problem fixed with the anti-spam appliance or software company is much more difficult. We have staff on hand who have been in the e-mail marketing industry since 1992 and their connections with major and minor content filter designers, anti-spam appliance/software makers is unmatched in this industry. Once we spot the problem and discuss with you the impact, we will then proceed, upon your request, to contact the content filter owner or anti-spam appliance maker and will work with them (and you) to remove the filter that is in place.

This is no easy task because many of the content filter owners or anti-spam providers assume you are a spammer by default so you must prove to them you have ALL of the following in place:

- Professional list management practices in place (handle unsubs, subs, complaints swiftly),
- Comply fully with the CAN-SPAM laws,
- Have a proven and tested opt-in and opt-out system. (some may require 100% confirmed-opt-in, see below),
- Send your mail from a "clean" IP space that is not used by spammers,
- Have a working ABUSE@(your domain) mailbox,
- Can prove the source of any e-mail address that complains,
- Have recently tested that you have no open-relay servers in your network (this is a spammers delight),
- Your ISP or network vendor has strict anti-spam measures in place and has no blatant spam issues,
- Have properly working Domain Name Servers and all servers have a reverse DNS entry in place,
- Have your SPF record setup properly,
- You have a complaint resolution process in place to assure no "repeat complaints" from the same recipient,
- (many other issues which we will discuss with you)

IMPORTANT: If we discover that you are horribly stuck in filters because of sloppy past mailing practices or your ESP has a terrible reputation, often times the ONLY solution is for you to convert your entire list to 100% confirmed opt-in (COI) and, if your ESP is dirty, you will need to find a better home for your e-marketing. Many anti-spam appliance makers and blacklist owners will not even consider helping you until you can prove you have fixed the problem that started all the filtering. This takes time and while we can get the ball rolling for you, it's up to you to get your list management into shape. We make no guarantees that you will be free from filters but we will give you everything needed to get your practices in top shape.

A Two Week Review For Just $350.00 (US)

This process takes significant labor to properly perform and the specialists involved often spend hours talking with the anti-spam appliance maker to smooth out any wrinkles your mailings may have caused. Our service will be performed over a two week process and will require you to "seed" an address onto your list for us to monitor. There are many "behind the scenes" activities we will also perform to validate your compliance with CAN-SPAM and validate your list practices. The moment we spot a problem we will contact you with the details. Some clients are given the good news after the two week period that there is absolutely nothing wrong - and that's very rare, but it could happen to you if your have been doing everything right.

NOTICE TO SPAMMERS: DO NOT APPLY FOR THIS SERVICE

If you have made your living selling harvested lists, CD's full of "opt-in addresses", or injecting your unsolicited trash through open relays, do not waste your time applying for this review service. This service is solely for professional companies with proven and working list management systems and follow best practices in the e-mail marketing industry. We will not work with any company that is in the business of spamming or pseudo-spamming by using 3rd party mail houses to distribute their unsolicited email. In summary, if you feel that sending unsolicited e-mail is OK, please close out your browser now - this service is not for you. We will work closely with Federal, State, and International law enforcement agencies to assist in their tracking down criminal-minded spammers.