How to Avoid Getting Your Emails Flagged as Spam (what spam filters look for)

The first step to successful email marketing is actually getting your emails delivered so they can be read.

This means you need to stay in the good graces of Yahoo, Gmail, and other email service providers so your messages get to see the light of day.

Here’s how to do that…

Email content no-no’s

It starts with the content of your email.

There are some words and phrases that will get your email rejected by Gmail and others, regardless of whether it’s actually spam or not.

Here are a couple of things to avoid in the subject line and content of your email:

FREE
The word “free” can send up red flags, especially in all caps. That’s one reason you see emails break up the word “FREE” into F*R*E*E and FR-EE. They’re trying to avoid the spam filters (and yes, email providers have caught on to this trick).

The truth is that the word “free” in and of itself isn’t bad, but phrases like “free membership”, “free money”, “free sex”, and “financial freedom” are red flags as well.

!!!
More than two !! in a row is also a hallmark of spammers.

ALL CAPS
Sometimes you want to put a little emphasis in your message. Using ALL CAPITAL LETTERS is not bad here and there, but spammers seem to live with the “caps lock” key engaged at all times. Take a deep breath, and then type your message using lower-case letters.

MLM
It’s unfortunate, but mentioning “MLM”, “multi-level marketing”, “network marketing” or “business opportunity” will throw up red flags.

Money
Terms like “make money”, “make millions”, and multiple “$$$” are red flags.

Miscellaneous
Any mention of cheap medication, erectile drugs, and other common spam fodder will definitely throw up red flags.

Images
If a significant portion of your message is an image, that’s a red flag. Spammers will often try to hide the content of their message using images and words in a picture (you’ve probably seen them).

Your email server

I’ll go into more detail in a future tutorial, but you should be aware that if your email is getting sent out through the same server as known spammers, you may get marked as spam simply because your message is coming from the same place.

So we’ll talk about ways to choose a good email list service and/or make sure you’re a part of a system that will get your emails delivered. The last thing you want is find out you’ve been banned entirely from Gmail, Yahoo, MSN/Hotmail, or any other major email service.

There are ways to make sure you won’t have to worry about that.

And of course future tutorials will also address how you can make sure your readers don’t click the spam button on you. Join my email list below if you’d like to see more on this topic!

Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next tutorial.