Less Junk-filtering for Your Newsletters

There's a technique to reduce the number of your newsletter mailings that end up in the recipient's junk folder.

It's not 100% effective. And the subscriber has to click on a link once. Still, if your newsletter mailings were junk filtered only half as many times, how much more response do you think you might have?

The link the subscriber clicks on delivers a VCARD. If the subscriber's computer is set up to receive it, the VCARD information is added to the subscriber's address book.

At least some, perhaps most, junk filtering mechanisms assume email from addresses in the address book are always wanted email.

An "Add us to your address book" link can be put on the subscription confirmation page. The link can also be put into emails mailed to the current subscriber lists.

Below is a live link. If it doesn't work on your system, it will still work on others.

Add us to your address book

When the link is clicked, a PHP script delivers a VCARD with information for your address book. The header sent with the VCARD describes the content type so your browser knows what to do with it.

How the VCARD is handled when the link is clicked depends on the browser and operating system. The user is likely to be asked whether they really want to add the information to their address book. In some cases, the user may need to click on the downloaded vcard to launch their address book software.

Here is a generator to produce the PHP script for sending your VCARD to the user.

When the VCARD delivery script is generated:

1. Copy the code and save it to your server as a PHP file.

2. Link to it so subscribers can add you to their address book and your mailings won't be filtered into their junk folder.

The generated code doesn't require any editing.

If you're interested in specifics of how a VCARD is constructed, this Wikipedia article is a place to start.

Although not all subscribers will be able to use it, linking to the VCARD delivery script may reduce how many of your (or your clients') emailed newsletters end up in the junk folder.

Will Bontrager