Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (Full Version)

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_gail -> Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (1/10/2004 13:23:19)

I have a mailing list to which individuals freely subscribe...25% of my subscribers use AOL. When I send the newsletter, each one sent to AOL members is returned. In no way can my list be considered SPAM!

(I use ListMessagner to send the newsletter, and for managing subscribers and unsubscribers).

I've spent hours on the phone with AOL "postmasters," and most of what they tell me relating to how to fix the problem is laughable. I'm not convinced they are there to really help and, if they are, each postmaster I've spoken to doesn't seem to know what they're talking about. [:@][:(][:'(][&:]

The problem for me is that this is effecting my income from my site, plus I pay for GoogleAds to let others know about my site.

Has anyone run into problems similar to this with AOL and, if so, how did you finally resolve them?

thanks, gail



Eli -> RE: Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (1/10/2004 13:39:33)

sorry to be the bearer of bad news - my friend in the states has a opt in mailing list topping 100,000 subscribers. Weekly mailings were made. ALL AOL accounts were stopped as junk. There was no resolution.



_gail -> RE: Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (1/10/2004 16:28:26)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Micah

sorry to be the bearer of bad news - my friend in the states has a opt in mailing list topping 100,000 subscribers. Weekly mailings were made. ALL AOL accounts were stopped as junk. There was no resolution.


So you mean no one with a mailing list can get to AOL users? Did he figure out any workaround?

One thing I'm going to try to do is send an email to each AOL subscriber and explain the situation. I will send it within 24 hours after I send out my newsletter. If they go into their spam folder, highlight the newsletter email and click on "this is not spam" everything will be fine. But what a pain. The light is finally dawning on me why many people call AOL, AO Hell. I'm mad!

gail



coreybryant -> RE: Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (1/11/2004 10:37:04)

AOL is screwy to say the least. They check the DNS from where the e-mail is sent. If it does not match or appear to me bogus - it is bounced. I.E. if it is sent from your domain name but has a different MX record & that MX record does not match - it is bounced. A lot of ISPs also now require you to use their SMTP server to send out e-mail. And these usually get bounced as well.

To show you how bad it is. I sent instructions to someone who has a CompuServe Account (which I guess is owned by AOL). I put in the regular expression, enter your domain name: http://www.yourdomain.com - they bounced it because www.yourdomain.com had been complained about! So they blocked it. Now of course I tried it agian a few minutes ago so that I would get the correct words, but it seems it went thru!



Thomas Brunt -> RE: Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (1/13/2004 9:02:45)

It's not just AOL. Lots of ISPs and corporate firewalls and individual firewalls and email clients are working so hard to get rid of spam that they're getting rid of legitimate publications too. We're all suffering, and I think this will get worse before it gets better.

ISPs and system administrators have no true interest in helping us. Less email is always better than more for them.

Email marketing used to be a fantastic thing. I'm afraid the glory days may be gone forever.

t



_gail -> RE: Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (1/13/2004 9:19:45)

How do you handle it Tom? You have a very large mailing list and must have AOL subscribers. There are a lot of AOL users so it's a big chunck out of an email list if mail to them is not accepted.

As an aside, I just sent out my newsletter yesterday and not one came back. How could this have happened? It is quite confusing.

gail



Thomas Brunt -> RE: Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (1/13/2004 10:33:04)

Although I do block out some of my replies with with words "Autoresponse" and the like, I still get hundreds of automated replies every week. More and more of those replies are from new subscribers who are using a Spam blocking services. I have to sift through the automated responses that don't conform to my filtering guidelines for the emails asking me to confirm that I'm not a spammer.

I really don't do anything for aol users. It appears that I'm getting through to some of them. I guess there are some who are literate enough about the aol system to allow my messages through.

t



Reflect -> RE: Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (1/13/2004 12:04:57)

quote:

As an aside, I just sent out my newsletter yesterday and not one came back. How could this have happened? It is quite confusing.


Gail,

It really sounds like your wording along with a non matching MX is setting off filters via your e-mails header.

I am in the middle of rolling out a spam solution for my day job. It uses a "weighted" measurement. It scores an e-mail in essence. It will add X points for non matching MX VS. domain via the header. It also gives scores/weight for certain words. It also gives score/weight for a string of words together. This is not a workstation filtering system it is a SMTP server level/ISP grade application.

From what I quoted it REALLY sounds like the wording in combination of other factors is an issue.

Could you PM me your latest reject by AOL and the latest non rejected news letters? I would be more than happy to give them a look over. Also are you sending them straight text or HTML (it does effect filters
GREATLY)? When talking with the postmasters (wow a new term for my resume [;)]) are they stating that it is the server that is filtering it out or ??? They should be able to tell you that much.

Brian



_gail -> RE: Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (1/13/2004 14:33:05)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Reflect


Could you PM me your latest reject by AOL and the latest non rejected news letters? I would be more than happy to give them a look over. Also are you sending them straight text or HTML (it does effect filters
GREATLY)? When talking with the postmasters (wow a new term for my resume [;)]) are they stating that it is the server that is filtering it out or ??? They should be able to tell you that much.

Brian



Brian, thank you. I will do so in a couple of days as I still have family visiting and a bunch of company coming the next two days.

I really (!) appreciate your offer.[:)]

gail



Reflect -> RE: Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (1/14/2004 10:06:57)

Least I can do [;)].

Brian



Thomas Brunt -> RE: Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (1/15/2004 9:45:47)

"EXCLUSIVE: AOL Sources Confirm Existence of
New Enhanced White List -- What Mailers Need
to Know

SUMMARY: Yes, there's a brand new white list at AOL, and if you're on it, your email will be delivered to 9.0 users without that pesky extra layer of filtering. Plus, your HTML and hotlinks will work even if recipients haven't yet buddy-listed you.

We're psyched to be the first news-source to reveal that this whitelist has launched - and how you can get on it:
http://www.marketingsherpa.com/sample.cfm?contentID=2568"

t



Thomas Brunt -> RE: Newsletter mailing lists & AOL (1/15/2004 9:53:41)

Also

http://postmaster.info.aol.com/guidelines/enhanced.html

t



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