E-mail is a powerful way to achieve your target audience and grow your customer base. Almost 60 per centum of users say that marketing emails influence their purchases. However, as online privacy and protection laws tighten, getting your emails into recipients' inboxes has become tougher.

If your emails are ending up in users' spam folders, don't worry. Past following some uncomplicated best practices, you tin not only make sure your emails achieve their recipients, just besides encourage college open up rates and brand a stronger impact.

In this article, nosotros'll explore why emails end upward in spam and what you can do about it.

That'due south a lot of ground to comprehend, so let's dive in!

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Why Spam Is a Problem for Email Marketers

Estimates indicate that as many as 60 billion spam emails will be sent every twenty-four hours between 2019 and 2023. Obviously, users don't appreciate that flood of spam. However, this is also a major problem for e-mail marketers. Up to 20 percent of emails will never make information technology to the recipient'due south inbox, preventing you lot from reaching your audition.

With email delivering an boilerplate Render on Investment (ROI) of 122 percent, it's important to minimize the hazard that your messages are in that 20 percent. Every email that lands in spam is wasted money on your part, both for the email itself and whatsoever potential conversions it might accept generated.

Fortunately, in that location's a lot you tin can do to keep your messages out of spam folders, and most of it is adequately straightforward. In the next department, we'll look at some of the about common reasons email goes to spam, and see how you can avoid them.

60% of users say that marketing emails influence their purchases... but if your emails are going straight to spam, you're missing out on major marketing impact. 📩 Make sure they accomplish your audience with this guide ⬇️ Click to Tweet

Why Are My Emails Going to Spam? (9 Potential Reasons)

There are numerous reasons emails might exist identified as spam, ranging from keywords that trigger spam filters to incorrect permissions.

Let'due south walk through some of the most common scenarios, and explore what y'all tin do to brand sure your messages country in users' inboxes.

ane. Your Recipients Marked Your Emails as Spam

The first and most obvious reason for your emails ending upwards in spam is considering your recipients put them there.

Even if your content is potent and the recipient expressly gave you permission to contact them, they may still decide to mark your e-mail every bit spam as a way to clean up a cluttered inbox.

They may also take forgotten why they subscribed to your listing in the outset place, or simply made a mistake.

Reporting email message as spam
Reporting email message as spam

Unfortunately, if plenty of your messages get flagged by users, it can cause spam filters to flag your address and showtime sending your postal service to spam automatically.

This means your messages may cease up looking like spam, even to users who haven't explicitly flagged you in the past. This is especially likely in Gmail, Outlook, Yahoo, and other services with heavily AI-driven algorithms.

Once the email ships, in that location'southward non much you lot can do to prevent someone from mark your emails as spam.

What you lot can do is brand sure your content is meridian-notch, and that you follow other best practices to avoid having your e-mail perceived every bit spam by users. This can minimize the chance that someone will intentionally flag your communications. We'll cover some of these strategies in the following sections.

two. Y'all're Not Following HTML All-time Practices

While text-only emails are fairly straightforward, they might non be a feasible option for some businesses similar ecommerce stores as they may atomic number 82 to lower engagement when compared to emails that include branding, images, and other HTML elements.

However, when including HTML in your messages, information technology's important to follow some simple rules to ensure that they don't stop up in spam folders.

Hither are some HTML best practices for email, according to Mailchimp:

  • Keep the maximum width of your email between 600 and 800 pixels. This ensures that information technology's large plenty to read easily, while also behaving well in e-mail client preview panes.
  • Assume that any images will be blocked past email clients and that users may non meet critical information if it'southward contained inside media elements.
  • Go on your code as clean and calorie-free as possible, particularly CSS. In improver, avoid JavaScript and Flash entirely. These may be seen every bit vectors for attack past spam filters, and many email clients don't support them anyway.
  • Make sure your messages are mobile-friendly. In fact, it'south mostly a good thought to design everything with a mobile-first philosophy these days. That ways thumb-friendly buttons, small images that won't overload mobile networks, and e-mail-safe fonts that are readable on small screens.
  • When it comes to fonts, you'll also want to make sure the ones you cull are cross-platform and clearly legible. Arial, Verdana, and Georgia are all solid options.

Finally, it's a good idea to make nigh of your electronic mail'south content text, and minimize the amount of HTML you include. Your visitor branding and maybe a pop of colour can do wonders for engagement, without going overboard.

iii. Your Subject Lines Are Misleading or Contain Spam Triggers

Discipline lines are typically the kickoff impression a user gets of your message, then they demand to grab attention and entice the reader to open up the electronic mail. However, they too need to be honest. A misleading subject area line isn't just poor etiquette, it's also against the law, according to the CAN-SPAM Act.

Over one-half of email respondents report feeling cheated or tricked into opening an email based on the subject line, according to Litmus. That'southward a quick mode to get your email tossed in the spam folder, and it may even lead some users to unsubscribe.

email headline re
Letters that begin with RE: simply are not replies ordinarily go labeled as spam

What does a misleading subject line wait like? Here are some examples:

Subscribe Now

  • RE or FW. Don't offset your bailiwick lines with "RE" unless yous're actually replying to something. It's a blatant trick and a quick fashion to earn an unsubscribe. Similarly, using "FW" can make the person recollect they know yous (the definition of misleading).
  • Personal letters or leading questions. Subjects like "Did I leave my telephone at your place?" or "Did you hear about so-and-so?" may make users question whether they know the sender.
  • Overly sensational claims. Some discipline lines aren't necessarily lies but are still a little too over-the-meridian. In general, yous want to make sure that your field of study line matches the content the reader volition find in the email.

Your subject lines should besides be professional. That means no TYPING IN ALL CAPS and definitely no spelling or grammar errors. The free tool Grammarly tin can check your spelling, grammar, and punctuation automatically, and alert you of any issues that may alert spam filters.

Now you know what subject lines to avoid, but yous still need to entice subscribers to open your messages. Hubspot has some excellent recommendations for creating strong headlines:

  • Starting time with action verbs.
  • Create a sense of urgency and importance (but once more, don't be misleading).
  • Pose an interesting or compelling question.

Finally, recall: any your subject field line ends up being, make sure the content delivers on its promise. Otherwise, y'all risk damaging your reputation.

4. You Don't Take Permission From Your Recipients

This one is simple: online privacy laws like the GDPR crave that you lot must have limited permission from recipients in lodge to ship them emails. That means you can't simply purchase email lists to get quick admission to a bunch of contacts (this isn't a good idea for other reasons, as well, including poor targeting).

Notwithstanding, it too means that even users who provide their email addresses on your site need to explicitly tell yous that they desire to receive emails from you, especially if they're a citizen of the EU. This can come in the grade of a disclaimer during account creation or on your contact course, or information technology could be a checkbox that users need to tick to point their willingness.

While this isn't necessarily required in the U.Due south., information technology's even so a good do. People get a lot of emails these days,and if your messages kickoff suddenly appearing in someone's inbox when they didn't ask for them, there's a decent hazard they may be marked as spam.

5. Your Content Triggers Spam Filters

Spam filters cheque for certain words (or combinations of words). If an e-mail gets enough hits or contains those words in addition to some of the other items on this list, it can end up in spam folders. Spam trigger keywords can include:

  • "Free"
  • "Everyman price"
  • "Boosted income"
  • "Piece of cake money"
  • "No cost"
  • Multiple exclamation points or dollar signs in a row
  • Words with unnecessary spaces or punctuation
  • Words that are in ALL CAPS

In general, these are words that are either heavily sales-oriented or clearly designed to become around spam filters (such as the actress spaces). While using a scattering of these isn't necessarily a capital punishment for your messages, using too many of them can be.

spam headline keywords
Overly 'salesy' language and too many keywords can trigger spam filters

Of course, some of these keywords are tough to avoid, peculiarly if you're sending ecommerce or financial emails. To get around this problem, you tin can use varied linguistic communication and try to get artistic about how you phrase things.

Above all, it's smart to avoid pushy or "salesy" language and make sure yous're post-obit proven best practices for writing email content we're highlighting here.

6. Y'all Don't Include an Unsubscribe Link

Laws like CAN-SPAM in the U.S. clearly state that your emails must include a articulate way to unsubscribe. Additionally, if someone does click on the unsubscribe link, y'all'll demand to process that request inside ten days, and you can't forcefulness the user to bound through any hoops.

While this might seem similar a bad thing (why would you lot want to give people the run a risk to unsubscribe?), it can actually have the reverse effect, provided that your content is stiff. Giving people an like shooting fish in a barrel manner to become off your subscriber list shows that your make is trustworthy.

On the other paw, hiding or simply not providing an unsubscribe choice is a cinch way to frustrate people. Information technology tin can as well event in negative press near your newsletter (word travels fast on the internet), and generally rub people the wrong way.

vii. Your 'From' Information Is Incorrect or Misleading

A major reason that your emails may end upward in spam is wrong 'From' information. The 'From' line, the i that tells your recipients who sent the email, needs to be authentic and not misleading. In some cases, a tool on your site such as a contact grade plugin might be sending 'spoof' emails with 'From' details that trigger spam alerts.

If your contact form emails are getting flagged as spam, the fix is unremarkably pretty simple. You'll want to make certain that the 'From' field in your contact form settings has the admin address for your site, rather than the email accost entered into the grade. If y'all're having the contact form send you email notifications, also brand sure the addresses used in 'From' and 'To' are different.

8. Y'all Haven't Set Email Authentication

Some other common reason that your emails' 'From' information may exist wrong is when email authentication isn't properly ready through a service like Mailchimp (or one of its alternatives):

Authentication authorizes the service to ship emails on your behalf, then they'll appear with your domain proper noun attached even though they were sent by a third party. If your authentication isn't prepare properly, your emails tin can terminate upwards going directly to your recipients' spam boxes.

In that location are a few unlike types of email hallmark out there, with the primary ones being DomainKey Identified Mail (DKIM), Sender Policy Framework (SPF), and DMARC.

DKIM provides an encryption central and digital signature to verify an email, while SPF works by verifying the IP address of the sender against a list of approved IPs. DMARC is a bit different, in that it requires the other two to be enabled and lets the sender bespeak that their emails are protected past DKIM or SPF.

If you use an automated email service and you're having problems with delivery, authentication is a good kickoff thing to check. If y'all need assistance with this, nosotros have a handy article detailing exactly how to fix upwards e-mail hallmark.

nine. You're Sending Too Many Attachments

Attachments are a huge ruddy flag for virtually spam filters. This is because files can be easy vectors for malware and viruses. The general dominion of thumb is to simply non ship any attachments at all, especially in newsletters. If yous do need to send an attachment, make sure the recipient is aware ahead of fourth dimension, and minimize the number of files you adhere to a single email.

If you have to attach a document or file to an electronic mail, a safer bet is to first upload it to a cloud storage service like Google Drive or Dropbox. You can then include the link to the file in your e-mail. That way, your message shouldn't trigger any spam filters.

Save your marketing emails from the spam folder with this guide 📩 💥 #EmailMarketing # Email Click to Tweet

Summary

There are many reasons why your emails might end up in spam folders, from poor discipline lines to keywords that trigger spam filters. Any the reason, it's important to resolve the issue to maximize your return on investment and maintain a trustworthy reputation amongst your audience.

By addressing these problems quickly and implementing some proven best practices, yous can easily keep your messages out of spam. Best of all, those same practices can besides increment your messages' impact, and hopefully convert more subscribers into customers.

Exercise y'all have whatever questions about the email marketing best practices outlined in a higher place? Let us know in the comments section below!

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