Email marketing done right?

6 May
2008

E-mail spam

The last time I have done e-mail campaigns was about 8 years ago, and I never thought I would have to do it again but our company is now trying to offer this solution so now I am trying to get up to speed on the latest trends in email marketing.

When I used to do this back then there were two key issues:

Keeping your e-mail server from getting blocked
Bypassing spam filters

Of the two items, #1 is of utmost importance. The e-mails that we sent were definitely legitimate. In fact, the subscribers paid $3,000 / year for it. However, no matter how legitimate the content, some mails server’s spam filter will ultimately tag your e-mail as spam, and because you have no choice but to send those e-mails, eventually those servers will flag your IP address for abuse, and in a few weeks it ends up on Spamcop or some other email IP blacklist.

My solution back then was to make use of sender policy frameworks (SPF) that identified the sender as coming from a legitimate source. This would bypass some spam filter and slow down IP blocking, but not entirely. I still had to keep changing my mail server’s IP address every so often. I wish I could recall the actual software I used, but that was 8 years ago and my memory of it is dim.

My question for you experts now is this. What are modern day setups for sending e-mail campaigns, without getting your IP or e-mail blocked in one way or another? Is utilizing SPF still the best way to go about this?