Confirmation emails trigger spam traps: some remedies

One of the messages to come out of Return Path's recent Reputation Benchmark Report is that sending email to spam traps is bad news:

"We found a 20 point difference in delivery rates for IPs with just one spam trap hit."

That spam trap hit might be an indicator of other poor practices that are dragging delivery down. But we certainly know that emailing spam trap addresses is one criteria that ISPs use when deciding if your mail should be given harsh treatment.

No problem, I thought. Email addresses only get added to my list if the owner clicks on a confirmation link in an email sent out after they sign-up (i.e. closed-loop or double opt-in).

Spam traps can't click on links. So...no spam trap address goes on my list.

Hurrah!

But wait...

If I send a confirmation email to a spam trap address, doesn't that count as a spam trap hit, too?

Won't the ISP label me a spammer because I sent an email to that address? Even though I used a system specifically designed to prevent such addresses making it onto my list?

I asked Return Path's George Bilbrey, VP & GM Delivery Assurance Solutions, if he could clarify the situation. Here's what he told me...

"Spam trap hits do hurt deliverability. They are one of the major ways that ISPs and filtering companies detect spam and spammers.

"Most of the systems that use spam traps use a more nuanced approach than 'This IP address hit one spam trap, I'm going to block this IP.'

"Typically, spam trap hits are one of several factors considered and it requires more than one spam trap hit for there to be major deliverability issues. Unfortunately, some systems aren't that nuanced.

"As you noted, closed loop opt-in doesn't mitigate the risk of hitting spam traps with welcome/confirmation messages. There are some techniques that do mitigate the risk:

"1. Use a different mail server with a different IP for confirmation messages. There are two benefits from this approach.

"First, if you do hit spam traps, the damage is limited to your confirmation messages.

"Second, it is easier to make a case with an ISP/blacklist to take action if you run a closed loop opt-in service and that can show that a low(er) volume of only welcome messages come from that IP.

"2. Check the email addresses for obvious malicious entries. Scan for addresses with trap, honeypot, abuse, *master, and other keywords that might lead to trouble.

"3. Check for (and prohibit) mass additions of email addresses from a single IP. At Return Path, we have run various services over the years with email sign up forms. We have noted that when we see a mass submission of addresses from a single IP, that is usually followed by hitting a spam trap.

"Note that there are some cases where there are good reasons to see a lot of submissions for a single IP or a small range of IPs."

More on delivery reputation | Tags: email marketing, email deliverability, spam traps

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