Here's How To Keep Your Emails Out Of The Spam Folder

Hola amigos,

One of the questions I get most often from marketers and entrepreneurs is, “How can I avoid my emails going to the spam and promotions folder/tab?”

Spam folders have been around for a long time. The first email was sent in 1971 and by 1978, the digital world experienced its first spam email thanks to a man named Gary Thurek (pictured above), a marketing manager who was promoting a new model of computer.

Thurek recalled that, “Complaints started coming in almost immediately.”

That’s so funny. The novelty of a spam email didn’t make it desirable even for a minute — let that be a lesson.

In 2013, Google introduced tabbed inboxes in Gmail to help users keep their emails organised. Messages were sorted into one of five tabs: Primary, social, promotions, updates, and forums.

This led to marketing emails ending up in promotions, instead of the coveted primary tab.

Speaking of which, that’s what I am going to help you with today!

Landing in the primary tab starts with your first email

When someone signs up for your email list, do you send them a welcome email? You should. The welcome email presents your best opportunity to stay out of the spam or promotion folder.

Welcome email step-by-step

Let’s say a person is on your website, enters their information into a “contact us” form and then clicks the checkbox asking if they’d like to receive promotional content from your company.

Upon submitting the form, a thank-you message should appear on the screen and it should say something like,

You’ve given them explicit instructions that are easy to follow, and now they’ll be on the lookout for this confirmation email.

This is SO important because when a new contact opens the first email you ever send them, that tells the AI that your contact is engaging with your emails. You’ve now (more than likely) avoided the spam folder with this engagement.

Once the contact opens your confirmation email, make sure to address them by name, thank them for signing up, and provide them with one of 3 things:

• Valuable content to read/watch/listen

• A “next step” CTA

• A discount code

Ideally, these actions would require the contact to click on something. The act of clicking improves your email’s click rate while also (once again) letting inbox providers know that the contact is engaging with emails sent from your IP address.

Here are 4 examples of great welcome emails.

Ask for your email to be whitelisted

One of the best, most underutilised ways, of getting exclusive access to a contact’s primary tab is to ask the contact to whitelist your email.

Whitelisting an email is just a fancy way of saying, “Add me as a contact”.

I hate making guarantees about anything in life, but getting your email whitelisted all but ensures you will always end up in a primary tab.

As Clean Email puts it:

Whitelisting an email is different on every inbox provider, so here is a comprehensive guide to providing whitelisting instructions for Apple Mail, Outlook, Yahoo! Mail, Gmail, Android (Default client), Windows Live Desktop, and AOL Mail.

Staying in the primary tab

Once you’ve earned the privilege of being in a contact’s primary tab, it’s now your mission to stay in the primary tab.

The easiest way to stay in the primary tab is to continue to send valuable content to your subscribers.

In fact, that’s the Golden Rule for all forms of marketing: Thou shalt always provide valuable content.

Much like someone can choose to unfollow you on Instagram, Twitter, or TikTok, an email subscriber can choose to unsubscribe or relegate you to the spam/promotions tab if what you’re sending isn’t providing them with value.

“Value” is somewhat of a subjective word. That’s obvious. However, in my experience, value, when it comes to email marketing, usually means one of 5 things:

1. You solve a contact’s problem

2. You teach a contact about something

3. You save a contact money

4. You make a contact smile

5. You are consistent

And all those different kinds of value depend on you not inundating your contacts with emails…but also not sending out emails randomly every few months.

It’s a fine balance.

Now, dearest amigo, its incumbent upon you to go away and implement these strategies into your website forms and welcome email.

Adios,Andrew

Twitter | LinkedIn

P.S. I had the best Father’s Day and I’m feeling generous so I am offering 50% off my year-long membership! Click below to take advantage of the offer, which includes a LIVE monthly Q&A session + comprehensive email audit!

Last week, a subscriber named Michael booked one of my FREE 15-minute business growth consultations. We spoke about list hygiene and best practices for onboarding new contacts.

If you’re looking to make more $$$ from sending emails to your list, click below!

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