When I was a child, ham was very expensive, so I used to have spam on my toast instead. Today, I love eating spam and ham, although if someone asks me whether I like spam or not, I make a grumpy face in repudiation…I don’t think about the bread spread when listening to that word […]
When I was a child, ham was very expensive, so I used to have spam on my toast instead. Today, I love eating spam and ham, although if someone asks me whether I like spam or not, I make a grumpy face in repudiation…I don’t think about the bread spread when listening to that word anymore…
Allow me to share with you what is spam for me nowadays, and what does spam mean in modern society.
Contents
What is spam?
Spam is each and every message sent to me, which I have not explicitly asked for. In most cases, the annoying emails with commercial offers that I really don’t care to know about.
Remember my previous post where I stated that your emails, are visitors to ISPs? Well, I am now telling you that on the etiquette, attendance is expected to be “by invitation only”.
Consequently, when you sent email campaigns to all the addresses you buy, have on the bottom of an old hard-drive, automatically collect on all the webpages you browse (or that little automated process – called bot, finds), you are in fact trespassing this contact’s “private digital space” and annoying guests by wasting their time and resources not meant for you and so eventually, through feedback, ISPs will know that you are not welcome.
You are a Spammer?
I beg your pardon??! Easy! We know perhaps it’s not your fault but the truth is that without realizing, we can do it. Don’t worry! We will help you! Discover in this funny infographic if you already follow good practices.
Spamtraps: The undercover cops
More so, if during the visit you are regularly requesting to contact with unknown patrons (recipients), or even worst, contacts which are specifically created to attract intruders (called spamtraps as these do not request ever, any messages to be delivered to them) and then, ISPs will grow suspicious of you being an invited guest, and will initially call their guards (they have well trained and self learning, anti-spam systems) to control all your moves and eventually, they might kick you off. And remember, if you keep banging that door, they will lock you out for good!
You have an email account of your own, right? Lets swap shoes for a moment, please. How would you feel when trying to find that message, regarding the details for your dream holidays, and all this junk email is filling up your inbox? Even worst, if you have a limited sized email account and your messages are being returned as undeliverable, not even getting the chance for you to read them? What can you do to prevent this from happening?
The fight against SPAM: Recommendations
Well, I recommend that you start flagging spam as (yep, that is!) spam on your ISP’s client tool. Do not reply ever, as you would be validating your email address and will soon start receiving even more unsolicited debris.
Do not advertise your email address everywhere just slightly interesting – offers/news/tips. Actually, I would recommend you to create a separate email for online submissions.
Allow me to conclude, by receding to our etiquette…
Do you like someone to enter you house, not being invited? Off you go to check (ideally, you would confirm) all your invitations…