In email marketing, spam is often thought of as unsolicited or unwanted email. In practice, however, spam is anything a recipient marks as spam or abusive.
Every person you email has the ability to report your message:
- Through their email provider (ISP): For example, by clicking “Report Spam” in Gmail, Yahoo, or Outlook.
- Through the unsubscribe link: Every email sent from the Keap network includes a CAN-SPAM–compliant unsubscribe link that also provides options to mark the email as spam or abusive.
Keap receives these reports in two ways, both of which count toward your overall spam complaint/abuse report rate:
Why is my Email Broadcast Disabled?If your Email Broadcast Builder is disabled, there is likely an email compliance issue on the account. The account owner should look for an email with additional details and next steps. If the email cannot be located, please contact Support for assistance. |
Provider Feedback Loops
When a contact marks your email as spam or junk within their inbox, the email provider may send Keap a notification through a Feedback Loop (FBL).
- Not all providers participate in feedback loops, and some (like Google) send very few or no reports back.
- When available, these reports allow Keap to identify which message generated the complaint.
Internal Abuse Reports
Keap also tracks abuse signals from the unsubscribe process. Every email sent through Keap includes an unsubscribe link in the CAN-SPAM block. When a contact clicks it, they see an opt-out form with options such as:
- I did not request email from this sender
- This is not the content I expected
- I received emails more often than I expected
- This email is spam and should be reported
- I’ve previously unsubscribed
On the Opt-out screen, these selections are recorded as Complaint types in the Recent Complaints report (found in the Complaints section of the Email Health Last 30 Days widget).
Note: If a recipient does not select a reason, or they choose “I no longer want to receive these emails,” it is not counted as abuse. This is the ideal outcome when someone opts out, as it shows they simply unsubscribed without flagging the email as spam.
This screenshot shows the Opt-out screen. In red is what you will see under the Complaint type row in the Recent complaints report. The report is in the Complaints section of the Email Health (Last 30 days) widget.
It is generally accepted in the email marketing industry that spam rates over 0.1% (1 complaint per 1000 unique email addresses sent to per provider) are excessive. This metric is tracked per email provider and not as global rate. The Math used to determine this rate is as follow:
Total number of abuse reports divided by the total number of unique counts of email addresses sent to multiplied by 100. The goal is to be at or below a rate of .100 per provider. In the app, on the email health widget, the spam rate is a global number and not per provider. When looking at the email data dashboard the complaint rate is split up by provider. If a user's global rate is above .100 there are issues to deal with and you can help the users by looking at the email data dash to see the per provider breakdown.
Spam complaints are tracked to email addresses sent through a specific provider in last 30 days.
For example, in the last 30 days you sent 10,000 email addresses in your marketing list. 500 of the addresses to are Yahoo email addresses. 5 of the Yahoo email recipients marked the email as spam, your spam rate with Yahoo is 5/500 or 1%.
To get an idea of your spam percentage you can look at the Email Health (Last 30 days) widget under the Complaints section. There you can find the Recent complaints report. You can also look at each email broadcast report and manually tally your rates.
How to Fix Spam Related Issues
If you have received an email from Keap's Compliance Team please review this steps below and complete these important measures to reduce your spam footprint.
- Perform List Hygiene
- Audit your email marketing list and ensure that you have Explicit Permission to send email marketing to everyone on the list. If you have permission questions then reach out to support or re-read the Best Practices Handbook
- Audit your webforms and landing pages to make sure that permission is voluntary, the expectations are clear and the branding is consistent.
- Audit your email sending practices to verify that your sending schedule adheres to the expectation set on the landing pages.
- Verify that subject lines are not spammy
- Double check your from address and ensure that it is consistent and recognizable
- Turn on the Automated List Management tool (Max Classic user only)
Common Causes of Spam Complaints
Lack of Permission
When a contact shares their information with you, it should clearly state that they are signing up for email marketing from your company. We recommend using a checkbox and a double opt-in sequence to ensure that permission has been granted.
Specific Examples:
- A list of email addresses was purchased from a third party.
- The list of email addresses was borrowed from another user/business.
- The list of contacts was obtained from a trade-show or event
- Someone gave you their business card
- A customer purchased a product from your company and they are automatically signed up for a weekly newsletter
- A customer requests a free e-book and they are automatically signed up for the weekly newsletter as well
For more details on email marketing expectations grab a copy of our Best Practices PDF
Poor Expectations
Contacts will often mark unexpected emails as spam. Set expectations for the recipient about your emails in regards to what, when, how often, and from whom.
Examples of poor expectations:
- The contact opts-in for ONLY the monthly newsletter, but they unexpectedly receive weekly or daily promos/offers
- You inform your recipient that they will be receiving monthly newsletters, but you don't get around to it for a few months, then suddenly start to 'blast' emails to make up for lost time.
- You keep a very consistent pattern of a weekly newsletter then decided to send daily with no warning or consent from your customers
- Customers sign up for what appears to be an informative newsletter, but the emails only consists of ads or promotional material
- The content of the email does not relate to the content of the landing page
- The customer receives great email marketing for a time, but on occasion they get emails not relating to what they signed up for
- From address changes or is different from the landing page or business name
Remember, Keap products have great tools to help keep your email frequency consistent and within the expectations you set. For more details on email marketing expectations grab a copy of our Best Practices PDF
Inconsistent Branding
Branding needs to be consistent from the signup page to the email. If the email recipient doesn’t recognize who sent the email there is a good chance it will be reported as spam.
Hiding the Unsubscribe Link
On occasion we’ve seen our customers hide the unsubscribe link so that an email recipient can’t remove themselves from the email marketing list. Not only is this illegal and a violation of the Keap's Acceptable Use Policy, but it causes more spam complaints because it leaves the recipient no other options to opt out. Doing this puts you at risk for having your email functionality suspended.
Spammy Subject Lines
Describe clearly and directly what you are sending. People have developed an amazing ability to spot spam based on the subject line alone and will flag an email as spam without even opening it. Only use subject lines that are specific and relevant to your content.
Avoid anything that is deceiving or misleading, such as “RE:” or “FW:” Avoid vague phrases like “What’s up?” or “A quick reminder”. Avoid spam related words like “FREE” or including monetary amounts like “Earn $500 Today”.
Why Spam Complaints Matter
Keap wants to deliver your emails to your Client's inbox. All of Keap's customers share in our email network and if our network is identified as sending too much spam, it reduces our ability to deliver.
Keeping our spam rates low is a great way to show the ISPs that we are a responsible email sender and that our emails are wanted and expected by the recipient. If the ISP believes that emails from Keap and its customers is wanted then all of our customers have a much better chance of being successful email marketers.
FAQ
Why is the Email Broadcast Builder disabled?
If the Email Broadcast Builder is disabled, there is typically an email compliance issue on the account. The account holder should receive an email with details on how to resolve the issue. If the email was not received, contact Support to have it resent.
Why are spam complaints important?
Spam complaints can impact your email sending reputation and may reduce email deliverability for future campaigns.
What causes spam complaints?
Spam complaints commonly happen when contacts receive unexpected emails, receive too many emails, or no longer want the content being sent.
How can I reduce spam complaints?
Use permission-based marketing, send relevant content, clean unengaged contacts from your list, and make unsubscribing easy.
What happens if spam complaints get too high?
High complaint rates can lead to email sending restrictions or compliance reviews on the account.
How do I know if contacts marked my emails as spam?
Spam complaint activity can appear in your email reporting and may also trigger compliance-related notifications.
Looking for extra help?
If you’d like professional guidance with your email practices or recommended tools to improve your email practices and deliverability, check out these trusted partners:
- Email Deliverability specialist training, consulting and software
- List Cleaning
- Form Security
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