There are numerous things that can cause a mailing to be classified as spam; content is just one of those factors. Higher Logic recommends that you review the following best practices and apply them to your mailings in order to prevent your content being a spam trigger and ensure better delivery results.

Things to do

• Make sure exposed URLs are covered by text or an image. Receivers/filters can sometimes misconstrue as a phishing attempt because our system uses click tracking URLs.
• Use this email blocklist checker to check all third-party URLs that you plan to include in your mailing.
• Run your own content through the mail tester tool.
• Provide an easy way for recipients to unsubscribe from your mailings. An Unsubscribe link is required for all email messages.
• Make sure the text and background colors are not similar. Spammers can hide text in an email by matching the text color to the background color, so use a font color that stands out.
• Send a copy of the mailing to your own email account (e.g., gmail.com, hotmail.com) to see how it is classified.
• Add alt tags to your images (spacers, etc. do not need alt tags).

Things to avoid

• Third-party short links (e.g., bit.ly and tinyurl); these are typically blocklisted.
• Large images, excessive images, and too little text in the mailing. Also, we advise against image mapping.
• Dangerous HTML elements such as Javascript, iFrames, embedded content, and applets.
• PDF download links and any executables.
• Excessive punctuation, capitalization, hyphens, and UPPERCASE letters in the body and subject line of your mailing.
• Spam-trigger words in the body and subject line.