On one end of the spamming spectrum is the rabid anti-spammer who will threaten anyone who CC’s more than one e-mail. On the other end is the sleazy spammer who cares for nothing but his .0001% response from the innocent. In the middle is a vast group of people who just want to communicate in convenient and appropriate ways. This document should not be read or understood to constitute legal advice. It is simply indicating what "Best Practice" might be. If in doubt, you might want to ask yourself "does my email list make the world a better place?", or "are the vast majority of people on this list excited to be receiving it?".

• Falsifying headers (the part of an e-mail message that specifies where it came from).
• Using deceptive subject lines to trick people into opening messages.
• "Hijacking" other peoples' e-mail accounts or computers to send spam.
• Creating e-mail or IP addresses specifically to send spam.
• Sending unsolicited e-mail with sexual content.
• Sending e-mail to people who have requested to be removed from your list.
  

• Everyone on a mailing list is content to be a member
• Mailing lists joined by personal request can be left at any time
• Mailing list addresses cannot be used for any other purpose
• Mailing list policies and procedures should be documented and accessible
• Email should be identifiable as coming from the list
• Users should be careful to keep inappropriate messages off the list
  
  

There are three main reasons to use best practices:

Marketers do not have a First Amendment right to harass consumers who want to be left alone. That principle was reaffirmed recently when the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the legality of the government's do-not-call registry. The case focused on telemarketers, but clearly the ruling would also apply to spammers.

At the very least you need to comply with legal requirements if you are to maintain any long-term relations with recipients of your e-mails. (See CAN-SPAM Compliance) If there is a legal challenge to your list you will want to have been sure in your list building to have confirmation of the status of addresses. Much of this can be handled by choosing good mailing list software, which automates and logs information during the opt-in process. Then you need to be sure to back up the logs files, and save all confirmation e-mails that you receive.

Make sure that your email database includes opt-in evidence. You must be able to prove that every single name on your list really, truly signed up. Critical data is:

• IP address of computer the subscriber was using at sign-up
• Date of initial sign-up
• Location of Web site and the email that was signed up
• Any secondary confirmation or verification you received
  
  

It is Best Practice to keep copies of every request to join mailing lists and also of all confirming responses. The sending IP address and exact time of arrival should also be recorded. This information may be needed to investigate forgeries or just to demonstrate the bona fides of the list operator. It is not unknown for people to forget that they have joined a list and then to complain about the incoming email that they have requested. If suitable records have been kept then the list owner will be able to demonstrate that they have acted honourably throughout.

When an unwanted e-mail goes out, it is a waste of internet resources. When it goes to a bad address, and requires a bounce back e-mail, it is a double waste. If it is reported as spam, and administrators time is wasted, it is infinitely more disruptive to the running of networks. Your goal should be to trim your list to the truly interested, or let mechanisms allow people to trim themselves.

Any long term relationship is a two way street, and this is true for e-mail relationships as well. If someone isn’t interested in you, or what you have to say, leave them alone.

Whether you are sending information, or promoting a product, remember that people buy products and services from companies they trust. Think of your e-mails as part of an ongoing dialog between you and your potential customers.

It is accepted practice to use an existing list of past customers who have given you their e-mail address. Email sent by an organization with whom the recipient had previously established a relationship is allowable, provided that the sender provides a mechanism for recipients to easily remove themselves from the mailing list.
In case of dispute, the Bulk Email Sender should have a record of past correspondence.

Before starting to build a list further, you will need to develop a privacy policy for that list. People need to know what you will be doing with the list before they commit to being on it. They should also be aware of the process involved in getting off the list. If email addresses are acquired via a web page subscription form (or indeed through any other data capture mechanism) then it should always be entirely clear what purpose the addresses are to be used for.

You must let people know in advance if you are planning to share the list with others. The email addresses supplied for mailing lists should not be used for purposes that are unconnected with the list.

Many list management setups offer the ability to provide a list of all the people who have joined a mailing list. It is Best Practice to disable such features and to ensure that it is not normally possible to obtain such reports in an automated manner, in other words, keep it secure. There is an obvious danger that such lists will be used by the unscrupulous for the sending of bulk unsolicited email. Allowing list members to see the membership lists but preventing outsiders from doing so is not sufficient to prevent abuse, as spammers can join a list to view and copy it. It is always Best Practice to make the membership list disclosure policy clear.

To make it simple to join lists it is common to offer an option to join by means of a checkbox on the same web page that captured an email address for another purpose, such as a purchase. This is perfectly acceptable, but it is Best Practice for this checkbox to be unchecked, and require an explicit action to add the address to the mailing list rather than having joining as the default setting, which might be overlooked.

If a customer doesn’t want to receive e-mail from you any more, you will do more harm than good to your reputation by continuing to send them. Any good e-mail list software will have easy unsubscribe options built right in. This enables the recipient to automatically control what they are subscribed to.

List managers should provide an unsubscribe process which requires the fewest number of "clicks" possible. A "1-click" unsubscribe process is the ideal, as long as it is clearly stated that clicking on that link will immediately unsubscribe. A 2-click process may be necessary in some cases for security reasons, or if you find that many people are accidentally unsubscribing.

Subscribers should not have to go through the process of having to provide a password or to surmount other obstacles to removing themselves from mailings they no longer wish to receive. An unsubscribe request should result in the subscriber being immediately and completely removed from the mailing list. There should be a way for people to contact you if there is an unsubscribe problem (a list administrator contact address), and a way for you to manually unsubscribe addresses.

There should be a policy covering bounced, or undeliverable e-mails. Continually sending to a bad address is an undesirable waste of resources. Some e-mail list software has a mechanism, or the ability to add this in, for handling bounces.

A. Three (3) consecutive delivery rejections have occurred; AND

B. The time between the most recent consecutive delivery rejection and the initial consecutive delivery rejection is greater than fifteen days.

Discuss needed features and make some recommendations:
Essentially the software used should enable you easily to follow legal requirements, as well as best practices, and in fact, should make it hard for you not to.

It is Best Practice to ensure that potential and current subscribers to a mailing list are aware of the list's policies and procedures. This is most usefully provided on a web page, so that a single URL can be provided to those who need to consult the information. This URL may also include an archive of past e-mails if this is useful.

Mailing lists should have a specific person, or persons, who "own" the list and are responsible for its operation. It should be possible to contact the owner by email at an "administrative" address without using the list itself, as a back up method, in case of instances where there is trouble with the unsubscribe process. Therefore, the recipient’s actual e-mail address should be on the "To:" header line, not something like "undisclosed recipient", so as not to create unsubscribe problems.

I have personally sent out bulk e-mail, for non-profit community projects, using 3 different set-ups or methods, all of which I was happy with. These include:

Sending via a hosted online service, such as Vertical Response, Inc. where you pay per e-mail sent.

Setting up your own E-mail List software, such as Dadamail.org on your own server.

Ensuring that your email is received by the intended recipients requires some knowledge of the current state of e-mail filters, and what they look for. For example, an e-mail with this on the subject line:
v_i_a_g_r_a c_h_e_a_p_! or, C_H_E_A_P -_D_R_U_G_Z -_C H E_A P 05446

may not reach all of the intended. This may be an extreme example, but the whole subject of filters, and what to avoid sending needs to be studied. There is little information available.

Whitelist:
For maximum delivery you may need to ask people to add you to a whitelist, if they use one. For instance, some people who receive e-mail thru AOL.com have settings where e-mail is only delivered to them if the sender is in their address book.