What Are Email Blacklists and How to Avoid Them

1. What Are Email Blacklists and How to Avoid Them An email blacklist is a real-time system that determines if an IP address or a domain is sending out emails that can be classified as spam. If you are an email marketer, chances are that you have been listed on one blacklist or the other at some point of time. The reason this should concern you is that most ISPS use various Email blacklisting filters like SpamCop, Spamhaus and Barracuda Reputation Block List to scan your emails. If you are unfortunate enough to be listed in them your mail will go straight to the "Junk" folders, thereby harming your email deliverability. Keeping this in mind we need to understand how these blacklists work and what steps could be taken to avoid being listed in them. How does an Email Blacklist work? Spamhaus an industry leader in providing real-time actionable intelligence has provided an infographic flow chart that explains how emails are classified, based on the input from their database.

2. To explain in simple terms when your email hits the email recipient's ISP, depending upon their security policies they might cross-check against the Spamhaus database and do one of the three things: 1.Reject it as spam and bounce it back to the sender. 2.Accept it and move it to the inbox. 3.Filter it and move it to "Spam" folders. The 5 Critical Email Blacklists Although there are many email blacklists we should concern ourselves primarily with just 5 important ones. You can check if you are listed with them. 1) Spamhaus Spamhaus is an international blacklist that was founded to track spammers and spam-related activity. It compiles and distributes six Domain Name System (DNS)-based blacklists (DNSBLs) and one domain-based blacklist

3. (DBL). They have their database of spammer IPs and spam-trap email addresses. You can use the Spamhaus Blocklist Removal Center to get more details on the removal process. 2) Spamcop SpamCop determines the origin of unwanted emails and reports it to the relevant Internet service providers. They allow the recipients of unsolicited bulk to report the same to them and this is how their blocklist is maintained. 3) Barracuda Barracuda is a company that specializes in providing security, networking and storage products based on network appliances and cloud services and their list comprises of emails that have classified as spam based on user complaints and rejection. 4) Invalument Invaluement is an anti-spam blacklist consisting of IP addresses which either only send spam or which emit an extremely high percentage of spam. Most ivmSIP-listed IPs are from botnets, very elusive snowshoe spammers, or "black-hat" ESPs. 5) SURBL SURBL is a collection of URI DNSBL lists of Uniform Resource Identifier hosts, typically web site domains, that appear in unsolicited messages. It can be used for searching incoming e-mail message bodies for spam links. There are quite a few free sites that permit you to check if your IP address is listed in multiple blacklists. 1.DNSBL 2.MX Toolbox 3.DNS Stuff 4.DNSChecker

4. How do you get off an email blacklist? Every email blacklist database has its own set of conditions for flagging offensive IP addresses, so it's essential to find out why you were blacklisted and take remedial steps to fix the same. Many of these sites will provide directions on how to get de-listed, you will need to apply to those meticulously. It's a good idea to take some initiative at this juncture because the ISPs want to be sure that you are serious about improving your email practices. You can also get in touch with Email Delivery Experts at SpiceSend, who will walk you through this entire process and help you engage with your ISP more vigorously. How to avoid getting listed in Email Blacklists There are a few things you should do right away to avoid getting blacklisted: Eliminate Spam Traps One of the primary things to do to avoid being blacklisted is to prevent usage of harvested lists as these may contain "Spam traps". Spam traps are email addresses that have been inserted for the sole purpose of recognising harvested lists. Typically such harvested lists are usually the result of bots scraping the web for email addresses. The presence of such email addresses is a fair indicator that your lists are NOT opted-in. Build your opt-in lists Making a list of people who are interested in your offerings is a very scalable way to engage with your audiences. This might be a slower process but you can be sure that this will result in better conversions and fewer spam complaints. Email engagement Analyze and understand the behaviour of your email contacts, email lists will need to be cleaned of bounces and unopened emails (If you are sending mails through SpiceSend this should be a cinch) regularly. This should

5. ensure that you connect only with interested audiences. Also, don't keep bombarding them with emails too frequently, this might irritate them even if they are kind of interested in your content. Avoid spammy phrases in your emails Make sure that your emails are correctly worded, and the content is appropriate for the targeted audiences. Try and minimize the use of spammy phrases. Make sure that your emails are crisp and direct, and not vaguely worded. Conclusion Blacklists don't exist to make your life harder but are here to protect email users from receiving unwanted messages. As long as you follow standard email best practices and are constantly measuring your engagement with your contacts, the probability that you are listed in any database will be greatly reduced. Need an email marketing tool with great email deliverability? Try SpiceSend today - forever free, for up to 5000 emails per month!