Title: Ultimate Guide to Social Network bulk email delivery
Posted: Wed, 18th April 2007
Category: EmailGetting your mass email delivered to Hotmail Gmail and Yahoo.
This is the challenge facing every Social Networking site
builder, if you cannot deliver your email to members, you cannot
exist as a social networking site.
Email notifications are the bread and butter of the Social
Networking World, among the most important messages that keep
visitors coming back to your site are:
"You have a new message"
"Someone has responded to your post"
"Someone wants to be your friend"
and so on.
These messages are the honey to the bee, the irresistible lure to
keep your sites busy day in day out.
Many webmasters are stuck, their sites languishing in the
netherworld, the purgatory of the internet for two simple
reasons:
1. The mail is not being delivered at all
2. The mail is in the Junk / Spam folder
Both of these situations are terminal for the social networking
webmaster. In the first instance Hotmail can deem that your email
is not even worthy to be called Junk. Your site members have no
idea that there is activity going on, their mail is simply not
being delivered, your site quickly becomes forgotten.
At the most simple level, just as it is a Serious Offence to
interfere with 'Her Majesty's Royal Mail' in the UK, it should
also be an offence for Webmail companies to make this serious
interference. They should in fact ALWAYS deliver the mail
nomatter what.
The reality is that they don't or can't, it's a spam thing that
we're all aware of, and at the mercy of.
Hotmail had been playing playing a dangerous game, it appeared
for a while to be promoting a Sender Pays plan, by forcing the
sender to pay affiliated companies who would verify the sender,
and delivery would be guaranteed...at a price of course, the
equivalent of a Postage Stamp. That resulted in people migrating
to Gmail, so they now have a softer approach and that's what we
will be working on.
In the second instance your email is going directly into the Junk
Mail folder, chances are your members are not going to see it, or
if they do, you will not make a good impression.
The order of difficulty of delivery (ODD) from 0-10 for the most
popular online email services is approximately:
Hotmail 9/10
Gmail 7/10
Yahoo 6/10
Others 5/10
Any server running SpamAssassin at <4 points 7/10
So let's start getting your email delivered.
First acquaint yourself with these terms
SENDERID
SPF
You can search for these terms and find reams of information, but
we'll cut to the chase, time is money.
SENDER IDentification
Sender Policy Framework (SPF)
They are both the same thing, SENDERID was a Microsoft standard
that they have now made Open Source, and SPF is an Open-Source
framework, both attempt to verify the sender and successfully
deliver the mail.
What the information you find online will NOT tell you is the
sequence that you need to employ to make this all work, and how
to let the Webmail companies know you've done it.
To begin you MUST have access to your DNS ZONE files, if you do
not, you must be with a WEBHOST that will make DNS Zone changes
for you without complaint. For example we are Celtic Productions
are a perfect hosting company, because we allow DNS zone access,
but we can also recommend others just as good.
Take a second to check out our Hosting (PHPfox hosting is a
speciality) at http://hosting.celticproductions.net
There are good reasons to closely examine your hosting package:
(a) You should have your own IP to complete this process fully
(b) You need to control and protect your server and IP fully
(c) You need to ensure that you do not share an IP with 'bad
neighbourhood sites'
Now we must test your current Email server setup:
1. Go to
http://senderid.returnpath.net/how.php
2. Copy the generated email address given
3. Send an email to it from the address you are testing, wait a
few secs......
4. Click 'View Sample' to see the results
Usually this is the result:
MAIL FROM:
anonymous@myhosting.com
PRA: admin@mydomain.com
SPF-Record-Classic: none found
SPF-Record-MFROM Scope: FAIL none found
SPF-Record-PRA Scope: FAIL none found
SPF-Method Result: FAIL none
mydomain.com does not designate permitted sender hosts)
SenderID-MFROM-Method Result: FAILnone
mydomain.com does not designate permitted sender hosts)
SenderID-PRA-Method Result: fail
DomainKey-Status: bad format: FAIL No DomainKey signature found
DKIM-Status: failed (no signature found)
Return-Path: anonymous@mydomain.com
Received: from 00.00.00.00
by 00.00.00.000 for <6fVxC@senderid.returnpath.net>; Mon, 16 Apr 2007
08:17:38 -0500
Received: (qmail 14137 invoked by uid 48); 16 Apr 2007 15:17:02
+0200
Date: 16 Apr 2007 15:17:02 +0200
This email will be treated as follows:
Hotmail: Discarded
Gmail: Junk Mail
Yahoo: SPAM
Private protected servers: Discarded/Bounced
Imagine that that's your mass mailing to 5,000 members?
Disaster!!
Let's start fixing it.....
1. In your DNS Zone File you must add a new record
(Note:These might vary slightly depending on what server software
is in use, but the functions will be the same)
2. Click 'ADD A NEW RECORD'
3. Leave the sub domain field _______.mydomain.com blank
4. Choose TXT as the record form
5. Enter in the text input box v=spf1 mx ip4:00.00.00.00 -all
Note: Replace the 00.00.00.00 with YOUR IP ADDRESS
6. If you are being hosted, say by Celtic Productions, use the
following record:
v=spf1 mx ip4:00.00.00.00 include:celticservers.com -all
Replace the 00.00.00.00 with YOUR IP ADDRESS
You can check if your host has a valid SPF record by taking a
trip to Microsoft
http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/safety/content/technologies/senderid/wizard/
Enter the domain of your host and see what's returned. If you
cannot see an SPF record for your hosting provider, DO NOT use
the INCLUDE key.
If you are not sure about your own syntax, don't bother with all
the syntax checking tools available online, they are invariably
wrong.
Instead learn from the masters, just pop in other sites just like
yours that are very successful in the Microsoft Wizard page and
copy the SPF record, obviously not the giants ok? Unless you're a
giant too and have a range of IP's.
A good default is
v=spf1 mx ip4:00.00.00.00 -all
But you really need to include your host.
7. Get into your files or your script (e.g. phpfox, phpBB,
postNUKE etc.) and change all the relevant headers to match your
sending address. The relevant headers are the following: 'From',
'Reply-To' and 'Return-Path'.
To make this really clear, do not send an email that's says it's
from admin@mydomain.com if the headers say you're lying and it's
actually from your localhost and anonymous@yourwebhost.com
OK we are really getting there.
8. Test that configuration by returning to
http://senderid.returnpath.net/how.php Make sure it's a new
refreshed page.
Repeat the process above, cut n paste the email address, send it
a mail and click on 'View Sample'
Now we hope that you will get this result:
MAIL FROM: admin@mydomain.com
PRA: admin@mydomain.com
SPF-Record-Classic: v=spf1 mx ip4:00.00.000.00
include:celticservers.com -all
SPF-Record-MFROM Scope: v=spf1 mx ip4:00.00.000.00
include:celticservers.com -all
SPF-Record-PRA Scope: v=spf1 mx ip4:00.00.000.00
include:celticservers.com -all
SPF-Method Result: pass(mydomain.com: domain of
mydomain.com designates 64.13.231.59 as permitted sender)
SenderID-MFROM-Method Result: pass(mydomain.com: domain of
mydomain.com designates 64.13.231.59 as permitted sender)
SenderID-PRA-Method Result: pass(mydomain.com: domain of
mydomain.com designates 64.13.231.59 as permitted sender)
DomainKey-Status: bad format: No DomainKey signature found
<-Doesn't matter at this time
DKIM-Status: failed (no signature found) <-Doesn't matter at this
time
Return-Path: admin@mydomain.com
Received: from 00.00.000.00
by 00.00.15.194 for
; Mon, 16 Apr 2007
12:57:43 -0500
Received: (qmail 23647 invoked by uid 48); 16 Apr 2007 19:57:06
+0200
Date: 16 Apr 2007 19:57:06 +0200
If you get this far you are DONE, but only with the easy bit.
Your mail will now be turning up in the inboxes of Yahoo and
Gmail, and all Spam filtered private servers, but not Hotmail.
Congratulations are in order though, you've made it into Hotmail
JUNK folders, hey, any improvement is welcome.
Let's move the email into the INBOX and out of Junk forever, this
is the bit that they don't tell you.
Compose an email to
senderid@hotmail.com
Do not include a subject, and only write mydomain.com in the
body, preferably send it in text only format.
MAKE SURE YOUR SPF IS PERFECT FIRST!!
Some time soon you will get this reply from rmail32@microsoft.com
<---BEGINS
Thank you for submitting your domains to be included in the MSN
Hotmail Sender ID / SPF record cache. These domains will be
entered within the next 24-48 hours. As a reminder - please
submit any additional updates in a txt file. To insure your
records are up-to-date - we suggest you review them monthly and
test them using the verification tools on our site. For
additional information please visit www.microsoft.com/senderid or
www.emailauthentication.org.
Thank you
<----ENDS
Nearly done............
Now your mail will be delivered to the INBOX of Hotmail, provided
your users are not marking your mail as SPAM.
The next step is to join
The Junk Mail Reporting Program.
This is where you join the Microsoft Anti-Spam team, therefore
ensuring your own future success.
What happens here is that MS, Hotmail and MSN and LIVE allow you
to SEE what happens to your emails. You can see how and why it
was treated in a specific way.
So imagine the following scenario:
1. You send out a mailshot to 10,000 members
2. 150 recipients identify it as JUNK MAIL and tell Hotmail not
to show it again
3. Hotmail is unsure if you are a spammer or not, but gives you
the benefit of the doubt
4. It happens again
5 And Again
So now Hotmail have had 600 clear votes that your mail is JUNK,
the remainder is your accepted NOT JUNK margin.
To see all this activity, and learn to control it let's join the
SNDS.
Smart Network Data Services
Go to:
https://postmaster.live.com/snds/addnetwork.aspx
Enter your IP in the form and follow the instructions, you will
be made to login using your Hotmail account (no doubt you have 10
for testing purposes by this time)
They will ask you to verify an address that THEY think you should
have postmaster@mydomain.com, abuse@mydomain.com , from the give
IP range 00.00.00.00
You probably don't already have these email addresses (or you
wouldn't be here) so create one or all of them (Abuse is best,
but you MUST have postmaster too) before continuing.
They also ask for a representative name, give YOUR REAL NAME.
You will get the following email in 20 minutes
<-------BEGIN
John Doe (mydomain@hotmail.com) has signed up to view Hotmail
and Windows Live Mail traffic data for your network, 00.00.000.00
, and
has requested authorization to access that data.
John Doe has provided the following comments to help explain why
this
message is being sent:
If you are John Doe, click here to confirm that you can receive
messages at the selected address:
://postmaster.live.com/URLOBSCURED
If the above network is not managed by your organization, or you
believe John Doe should not have access to the data, please click
on this link: ps://postmaster.live.com/snds/auth.aspxURLOBSCURED
You are receiving this because you have signed up to be a user of
Smart Network Data Services, or a Smart Network Data Services
user has requested that this email be sent to this address. Smart
Network Data Services is a revolutionary Windows Live Mail
initiative, designed to allow everyone who
owns IP space to contribute to the fight against spam and protect
e-mail as a valued communications, productivity and commerce
tool. If you have questions about our privacy policy, please read
our privacy statement available at http://privacy.live.com.
If you do not wish to receive further mails from Smart Network
Data Services, you can remove yourself from the system by going
to https://postmaster.live.com/snds/pref.aspx, or sending an
email to
nocmail@microsoft.com.
<---------ENDS
OK click on the verify link and you get this:
John Doe (mydomain@hotmail.com) has been granted access to view
data for 00.00.000.00 -
00.00.000.00 and can now access it via the View Data page.
Then the magic begins, but you cannot see data for a few days.
IMPORTANT
Now you will be able to see what's happening your mail, and YOU
take steps to reduce your members marking it as SPAM, and reduce
the machine reading it as spam.
You do this by using the Smart Network Data Services to see
what's happening to your mail, then taking the following actions:
(i) Forcefully Un-Subscribing (deleting) members who junk you
(because now you can see who they are)
(ii) Offering clear unsubscribe links in all email
(iii) Using absolutely ZERO spam words in mails (particularly
subject lines, even innocent ones like Join today, buy, or any
aggressive call to action phrases. Write your mails as though
they're to a close friend.
(iv) Use simple benign language in your mails.
(v)Do not use ALL CAPS, Many scripts have their default emails
written in CAPS.
"LOGIN HERE TO CHECK IT OUT" = disaster.
You can test your language by seeing what triggers what in Smart
Network Data Services.
(v) Write about something simple using very few words or write
about many things using lots of diverse words. Think like the
Google Algo and look for spammy keyword densities (4%+) in your
mails.
(vi) Lastly you take positive action by asking your members to
whitelist you at their email provider, this adds up and
dramatically increases your Trust ratings.
CONGRATULATIONS! You are now no longer at the mercy of the
machine, you ARE the machine.
Normally we would list the links here, but in this instance we
are not doing so because the ORDER is very important.
Start this process now by moving your site to our servers or a
similiarly well-equipped, well-informed caring host.
http://hosting.celticproductions.net
As with all articles on Celtic Productions, this article is
protected by international copyright laws. It may be linked to
(we are of course most grateful of links to our articles),
however, it may never be reproduced without the prior express
permission of its owners, Celtic Productions.
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