- August 28, 2018 -
I'm still getting replies from an email I sent out a couple of weeks ago about Cheryl's traffic ticket eluding antics.
Same question over and over. "Is this for real?"
Same answer every time: 'fraid so. Unbelievable, isn't it?
(In case you missed it, you can check it out here.)
Oh, it gets better.
Remember the TV show LA Law? It was popular back in the mid-80's to mid-90's.
Remember the character Grace Van Owen played by Susan Dey?
Hold that in your head...
Cheryl's always had a bit of a lead foot and on one particular day, she flew through a section of town that was notorious for its speed traps.
And this time she got stopped and was issued a traffic citation. There was no talking her way out of this one.
Now her perfect record of never paying a fine was at stake!
So Cheryl decides if Susan Dey can "act" her way through a court case and win, there's no reason why she can't.
She contests the ticket and gets mailed a court date.
All is not lost yet!
Court date comes.
She goes into the court room, dressed in heels and a pencil skirt (remember it's the early 90's) and some brief case she found.
The judge asks what her plea is...
And then proceeds to say she's representing herself...for a damn traffic ticket!
So goes into action and hands out manila folders to the judge and whoever else looks interested and proceeds to "prove" why it's not her fault.
After walking back and forth across the area in front of the judge (because that's what Susan Dey does) while pausing for dramatic effect every once in a while...she says:
"I rest my case."
Crickets throughout the room. She wins. She thanks the court for their time, takes back all her manila folders, shuts her briefcase and walks out.
Just like that.
This is why I'm losing my hair. Lol
Now, in email marketing...if only it was that easy to elude spam traps.
It used to be that you just had to keep an eye on the content in your emails and avoid using words and phrases that email providers looked for when deciding "Yeah or Nay" on spam.
Now, the most important factor taken into account is engagement: how many people are opening your email and taking action?
The fewer who open your emails, the more likely you are to end up in the spam, junk or promotions folder.
Even more critical...if you keep sending emails to addresses that are no longer used by real people, you could be hitting Spam Traps.
And the tricky thing is that you can't always tell which emails are spam traps:
...misspelled emails are the easiest to spot yourself.
...recycled emails (once valid emails that have been abandoned and repurposed by email providers) are tough to determine without a list cleaner.
...pristine emails are those hidden inside website code (scraped sites and purchased lists are usually the culprits) and pure poison.
Unfortunately the ramifications can't be eluded by making nice with the powers that be... i.e. the ISP providers like Google, Yahoo, etc.
...your sender reputation is damaged.
...your bounce rate will increase and deliverability to valid email addresses will decrease.
...if you're unlucky enough to hit a spam trap run by one of the anti-spam blacklist providers, you'll be blackballed by potentially dozens of organizations.
So whaddaya do to stay out of a mess of a situation?
You know me...I don't beat around the bush.
The best way to avoid spam traps and maximize your engagement is by keeping your list clean...and only engaging with people who have opened or clicked on your emails in the last 3 months.
Tough love.
But it's how all relationships work, right?
If you're trying your darnedest to connect with someone you recently met, and they continually ignore you...
...why would you keep at it and risk being labeled a stalker?
Yet we do it with email.
Interested in getting that all automated?
Speaking of avoiding traps...it's those darn sand traps that are the bane of my existence.
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