Study Shows 17% of Opt-In Email is Blocked By ISP’s

This study reinforces the predictions and observations that WebAdvantage.net has been making in terms of the threat that irresponsible Spam filters have introduced to the email marketing world.

Seventeen percent of permission-based e-mail messages get incorrectly blocked or filtered by the top 12 Internet Service Providers, according to a study released today by Return Path, Inc.’s Assurance Services division. This represents a 2 percent drop in delivery rates as compared to fourth quarter 2002, and a 5 percent drop as compared to third quarter 2002.

Return Path conducted the deliverability study during the first and second quarters of 2003. The study tracked the delivery, blocking, and filtering rates of 9,956 e-mail campaigns sent by clients using Return Path’s Assurance Services. Blocking and filtering rates on the programs studied varied from a low of 1 percent to a high of 46 percent.

“E-mail deliverability continues to be a growing problem for companies who rely on the e-mail channel to reach customers,” says George Bilbrey, general manager of Return Path’s Assurance Services. “Since we began monitoring overall delivery, we’ve seen a downward trend in delivery performance. Companies need to closely monitor and constantly improve their deliverability if they want to make sure their customers are receiving and responding to their e-mail.”

The study showed that companies had the highest false-positive spam identifications and subsequent delivery issues with Mail.com and NetZero, at 38 percent and 34 percent, respectively. CompuServe and AOL followed, at 31 percent and 25 percent. Yahoo had the lowest incidence of blocking and filtering, at 4 percent, followed by BellSouth and Earthlink, both at 7 percent.

The Return Path study also indicated that the deliverability decline was less of an issue for long-term users of Assurance Services. Despite the overall decline, companies who have used Assurance Services since fourth quarter 2002 have seen deliverability rates improve by an average of 9 percent.

“As ISPs and system administrators aggressively — and appropriately — try to protect their users from spam, a lot of opt-in e-mail is victimized,” says Matt Blumberg, Return Path CEO. “It’s like throwing the baby out with the bath water. It is up to every company sending e-mail to make sure its campaigns are done appropriately so that they avoid triggering spam filters.”

The study was conducted using Mailbox Monitor, a delivery monitoring service that allows Return Path to accurately gauge delivery at the top ISPs — which represent more than 60 percent of most large companies’ mailing lists — as campaigns are being sent.

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