How To Reduce Spam Score
Emails are subject to a variety of tests and verifications to ensure that they are safe for your recipients and yourself.
We’ve seen this elsewhere in our blog: from senders’ reputation to email blacklists and IP reputations.
They all play a role in either helping your email land safely or keeping it from your prospects.
This blog will cover another verification type, spam score, and how to reduce it.
We’ve seen this elsewhere in our blog: from senders’ reputation to email blacklists and IP reputations.
They all play a role in either helping your email land safely or keeping it from your prospects.
This blog will cover another verification type, spam score, and how to reduce it.
What Is Spam Score?
We’ve taken a look at ISP Spam Filters and Email Error 550 in other blogs, both also related to spam. So what is spam score?
Essentially, spam score provides ISP spam filters with a measurement of how likely it is that your email is spam.
The measurement is based on DNS checks and an analysis of your email content to determine the likelihood of it being spam. The tests run the body or header fields of the message for spam-typical words, and whether the “from” address of the message exists. It also checks if your email address is authenticated.
The lower this measurement is, even negative, the better for your deliverability and for your email to be seen by your recipient. Anything above a 3 should not be sent out, and above a 5 the email will essentially remain unsent.
You can check your spam score with a tool such as GlockApps.
The measurement is based on DNS checks and an analysis of your email content to determine the likelihood of it being spam. The tests run the body or header fields of the message for spam-typical words, and whether the “from” address of the message exists. It also checks if your email address is authenticated.
The lower this measurement is, even negative, the better for your deliverability and for your email to be seen by your recipient. Anything above a 3 should not be sent out, and above a 5 the email will essentially remain unsent.
You can check your spam score with a tool such as GlockApps.
How To Reduce Spam Score
If your spam score is indeed on the higher end, there are some steps you can take to lower it.
Keeping on top of it on a weekly or biweekly basis is our suggestion, just so you are not taken by surprise when your email open rates are lower all of a sudden.
Without further ado, here’s what you can do to reduce your Spam Score:
Keeping on top of it on a weekly or biweekly basis is our suggestion, just so you are not taken by surprise when your email open rates are lower all of a sudden.
Without further ado, here’s what you can do to reduce your Spam Score:
Avoid spam-sensitive words and phrases
It’s always better to be preventative when it comes to email deliverability. Once a domain or address is regarded negatively, it may be some time before it improves.
To avoid this, always run your messaging through a spam checker for spam-sensitive words and phrases.
New ones pop up daily, and you never know what turn of phrase spammers may be using that you’ve unconsciously adopted.
Remain safe and take the time to do this exercise.
It also has the bonus of keeping your creative mind flowing by having to think of alternatives.
Avoid using images, hyperlinks, bold or italicized text, all caps, or symbols, and any attachments
Cold emailing is not the place for any of the above.
They will all make spam filters jump to attention and scrutinize your content a lot closer. In many cases, they are what will send you straight to the spam folder.
That email copy you’ve been working on? Never to be seen by prospects if you add pictures or hyperlinks.
Even signatures should remain as clean as possible from all of the above for maximum results. It may sound counterintuitive here, but the links to your company website or the image marketing have sent you will only prove fatal to your cold emailing or email campaigns.
If needed, create a separate email address exclusively for your cold emailing purposes with a bare-bones signature so that you can avoid falling into this trap.
And, as always with cold emails, follow best practices to keep it short, to the point, and relevant to your reader. Bold or italicized text, any form of symbols, or caps lock are triggers for spam that your easy-to-digest email should not feature at all. Write for a fifth grader and keep it clean.
Similarly, while links to company pages or attachments to white papers come in useful, it is not the time in your cold email to offer them. Send these once you’ve established rapport with your prospect, not when you’re contacting several of them at once. They will just poison the waters for you and send you the spam folder if you use them now.
Use a proper subject line
Your subject line is a vital part of your cold email, newsletters, or email marketing campaign.
It’s the introduction and the hook to catch your prospect’s attention.
You do not want it to look like spam, but to be creative and topical to your target audience.
Go over the subject line you are using, and make sure to avoid any common spammer subject line commonalities. Any dollar signs, overuse of exclamation points, caps lock, or spam words should be absolutely removed in all instances.
Keep your creativity and ingenuity going by experimenting with different subject lines that help you avoid tripping any spam alarms in your prospect’s mailboxes.
Use a proper “from” address with no digits
Whatever address you are using to send from should have your name, whether that is initials or full name, it does not matter.
But it should absolutely have no digits, and it should be tied to your company.
“From” addresses with digits are notorious for being spammers, whether they’re at the front or at the end.
And they are also typically sent from generic, free ISPs such as Gmail, Hotmail, AOL – not company-tied ISPs.
Yes, have a separate address specifically for cold emailing or sending out marketing emails to many folks at once, but follow the above rules if you do not want to end up in the spam folder when creating it.
777infoaboutdolphins@gmail.com is absolutely not the type of address you want.
Make sure the address domain you are using is authenticated
As mentioned above, another factor in your spam score is checking your email address’ DNS settings.
This refers to SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, which we have covered extensively elsewhere.
These are security settings you can, and should, set up. They help to authenticate your email and demonstrate that you are a real person that cares about your email’s security enough to want to protect it.
It signals to recipients that you care enough to go through the process of authentication to avoid spammers spoofing and thereby utilizing your address for their own purposes. This makes you a hundred times more trustworthy and less likely to be spam.
It’s always better to be preventative when it comes to email deliverability. Once a domain or address is regarded negatively, it may be some time before it improves.
To avoid this, always run your messaging through a spam checker for spam-sensitive words and phrases.
New ones pop up daily, and you never know what turn of phrase spammers may be using that you’ve unconsciously adopted.
Remain safe and take the time to do this exercise.
It also has the bonus of keeping your creative mind flowing by having to think of alternatives.
Avoid using images, hyperlinks, bold or italicized text, all caps, or symbols, and any attachments
Cold emailing is not the place for any of the above.
They will all make spam filters jump to attention and scrutinize your content a lot closer. In many cases, they are what will send you straight to the spam folder.
That email copy you’ve been working on? Never to be seen by prospects if you add pictures or hyperlinks.
Even signatures should remain as clean as possible from all of the above for maximum results. It may sound counterintuitive here, but the links to your company website or the image marketing have sent you will only prove fatal to your cold emailing or email campaigns.
If needed, create a separate email address exclusively for your cold emailing purposes with a bare-bones signature so that you can avoid falling into this trap.
And, as always with cold emails, follow best practices to keep it short, to the point, and relevant to your reader. Bold or italicized text, any form of symbols, or caps lock are triggers for spam that your easy-to-digest email should not feature at all. Write for a fifth grader and keep it clean.
Similarly, while links to company pages or attachments to white papers come in useful, it is not the time in your cold email to offer them. Send these once you’ve established rapport with your prospect, not when you’re contacting several of them at once. They will just poison the waters for you and send you the spam folder if you use them now.
Use a proper subject line
Your subject line is a vital part of your cold email, newsletters, or email marketing campaign.
It’s the introduction and the hook to catch your prospect’s attention.
You do not want it to look like spam, but to be creative and topical to your target audience.
Go over the subject line you are using, and make sure to avoid any common spammer subject line commonalities. Any dollar signs, overuse of exclamation points, caps lock, or spam words should be absolutely removed in all instances.
Keep your creativity and ingenuity going by experimenting with different subject lines that help you avoid tripping any spam alarms in your prospect’s mailboxes.
Use a proper “from” address with no digits
Whatever address you are using to send from should have your name, whether that is initials or full name, it does not matter.
But it should absolutely have no digits, and it should be tied to your company.
“From” addresses with digits are notorious for being spammers, whether they’re at the front or at the end.
And they are also typically sent from generic, free ISPs such as Gmail, Hotmail, AOL – not company-tied ISPs.
Yes, have a separate address specifically for cold emailing or sending out marketing emails to many folks at once, but follow the above rules if you do not want to end up in the spam folder when creating it.
777infoaboutdolphins@gmail.com is absolutely not the type of address you want.
Make sure the address domain you are using is authenticated
As mentioned above, another factor in your spam score is checking your email address’ DNS settings.
This refers to SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, which we have covered extensively elsewhere.
These are security settings you can, and should, set up. They help to authenticate your email and demonstrate that you are a real person that cares about your email’s security enough to want to protect it.
It signals to recipients that you care enough to go through the process of authentication to avoid spammers spoofing and thereby utilizing your address for their own purposes. This makes you a hundred times more trustworthy and less likely to be spam.
Conclusion
Spam score is something to keep an eye out for when sending out massive amounts of emails.
While you may think your messaging is targeted and relevant, it doesn’t hurt to be aware of just how you are doing numbers-wise.
It is, thankfully, rather easy to fix and to remain on the lower end of.
And if you run into problems with it now, you know how to fix it!
Plus, you can always use Warm to further warm up your email and verify it via creating conversations and email chains.
Join our launch list to find out more!
While you may think your messaging is targeted and relevant, it doesn’t hurt to be aware of just how you are doing numbers-wise.
It is, thankfully, rather easy to fix and to remain on the lower end of.
And if you run into problems with it now, you know how to fix it!
Plus, you can always use Warm to further warm up your email and verify it via creating conversations and email chains.
Join our launch list to find out more!
