How to Request a List Cleaning
From the Lists Tab, select one or more List(s), then click the List Cleaning button to see an exact quote before you start.
How to tell if a List Cleaning is a Good Investment
A Hard Bounce rate above 1% should be viewed as a warning sign. Hard Bounces alone can lead to spam folder placement of mail and/or rejections of mail but are only one of the many ways Email networks monitor and identify spam/scam emails. Often, a high Hard Bounce rate is indication that is it time to clean your list.
Infrequently mailed lists may be risky. If you have not mailed to these recipients in more than a year, getting the List(s) cleaned beforehand can help lower such risks.
Low Open Rates on email. Senders need to continue engaging with subscribers on a regular basis to stay relevant and in the inbox. Some recipients will loose interest over time, and it is imperative to monitor and set aside disengaged users for re-engagement campaigns. Networks networks recycle abandoned email accounts into spam traps and List Cleanings keep you in the inbox by removing them, and other stale email accounts that aren't actively used anymore.
More Profitable Campaigns
An old, or infrequently mailed list can degrade delivery results, get you blocked or even blacklisted. If your list hasn't been messaged in over 6 months or you are experiencing low open rates or high soft and hard bounces rates, a list cleaning can help improve ROI. A cleaning will result in a list of safe, deliverable addresses leading to higher response rates and more profitable campaigns.
A List Cleaning should be a infrequent occurrence. Targeting and Segmentation of existing list data is as important to maximizing delivery performance as is regular collection of new, fresh sign-ups. Old, stale data is most likely to contain problems.
Continuing to send to problem list data not only means more mail will land in spam or be rejected, but senders may well be able to reduce the recurring costs of delivery month-to-month.
Why a Clean List Matters
Spam detection methods involve a myriad a factors. A commonly overlooked cause of delivery problem is stale or old list data. ISPs (like gmail or yahoo) use the number of invalid address in your list, along with spam traps (and other hygiene), and abuse reports to build your Sender Reputation, and inform delivery of your messages.
An infrequently mailed list can be dangerous for results. Recipients that have abandoned their email account can be recycled Spam Traps in your list.
Single Opt-In or Unconfirmed Opt-In sign up forms may lead to collecting moles and bots. Confirmed Opt-In (COI) is recommended. Blacklisting networks may use their moles to infiltrate open sign up forms with loose data collection practices as a means of identifying senders that fail to follow best practices.
Purchased, harvested, or third party managed lists may contain moles, blacklisters and other email threats. If you're not in control of your email from sign-up to delivery, you may be at risk.
Some Spam Traps may even be setup to open and click on some of your messages as well. Not only can the suspect click/open activity skew your metrics, but in some cases, once you've collected a Spam Trap, a Data Hygiene scan may be the only way to accurately remove it from your List.
How it Works
Email Hygiene - Identifies Spam Traps, Zombies, Complainers, Bots, Seeded Trackers, Moles, etc
Email Verification - Is the address invalid? (e.g. Hard Bounce)
ReachMail List Cleanings perform both Data Hygiene and Email Verification scans. Data Hygiene encompasses much more than just the verification of addresses and seeks to return List Data that will maximize delivery performance metrics.
What List Cleanings Cannot Do
Lists Cleanings do not address complaints from users that report abuse, or a uninterested in the offer. Furthermore, engagement of recipients is closely tied to delivery placement with B2C traffic. Removing all the spam traps
List cleanings may not be 100% accurate. Email Verification and Data Hygiene methods are constantly evolving to keep pace with the latest trends in spam fighting techniques.
A list cleaning will improve the list but may not solve all list problems and is not a substitute for good data collection and list management policies.
How Often Should You Clean Lists
A good general rule is at least once a year. People change jobs and stop using personal email accounts regularly. The goal is to keep from accumulating large amounts of old, dead data. Removing unresponsive addresses frequently and using Confirmed Opt in sign up methods can help stretch this to two years if you are diligent, but remember, recycled spam traps ( Recycled Bounces ) are nothing more that abandoned email accounts that are now being used as spam traps. Spam traps will open and click on your messages but never buy, and sending to them poses a risk to inbox placement of your messages.
Use your own industry specific knowledge to your advantage too. If your industry has a high turn over rate for jobs, consider that you may need to run a List Cleaning more frequently to than other industries.
Feel free to contact support@reachmail.com to request a free consultation before starting any list cleaning.