Blog entries from Michael Weisel

10 Uses for Gold Lasso’s RSS to Email Feature…

Michael Weisel — Tue, 18 May 2010 00:51:33 +0100

About a week ago, we posted a query in our GLJive Client Community for our clients to come up with 10 uses for our RSS to Email feature. If you aren't familiar with this feature, here are a few of the sticky points:

* Automate your Email Campaigns based on your RSS feed(s)

* Customize messages and templates easily to include RSS feed(s)

* Control which feed(s) are included in which campaign including multiple feeds per campaign

* Control the timRead More...

Facebook Starts Sending Page Admins Weekly Stat Reports

Michael Weisel — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 11:41:06 +0100

Last night I received a message from Facebook regarding our Fan Page. The stats were rather vague but still helpful. Here are the stats that were reported:

+xxx Fans this week (xxx total Fans) x Wall Posts, Comments, and Likes this week (x last week) xxxx Visits to your page this week (xxx Visits last week)

The message looked a bit spammy at first until I checked out the headers. Plus the email address that it was sent to is only used for Facebook so that helped with the lRead More...

Adding eLoop Opt-In Forms to Your Facebook Fan Page

Michael Weisel — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 20:03:44 +0100

Brief Description
Examples
Using an Existing/Setting Up a New Opt-In Page
Facebook Fan Page Information
How to Setup Your Facebook Form
Adding the Form to Your Fan Page Wall

Brief Description

This document will help you setup or use an existing Opt-In form and add it to your Facebook Fan Page.

Back To Top

Examples

Here is a link to The Gold Lasso Fan Read More...

Yahoo! Intermitent Connectivity Issues Again...

Michael Weisel — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 20:27:31 +0100

Just received the following from the Yahoo! Postmaster team.

"We're seeing intermittent connectivity issues across our yahoo.com MXes starting early this morning.

If you are suddenly seeing queues to Yahoo! Mail, please stay tuned for updates and please refrain (at least for now) from contacting our Postmaster team about any deferral issues you started experiencing today. We're doing our best to get this resolved ASAP."

I will update again once I receive an update.

Spamhaus DBL (Domain Block List) Coming March 1st

Michael Weisel — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 04:23:06 +0100

Spamhaus (A nonprofit organization that maintains Real-time Anti-spam Protection) has announced on their website, that their new DBL (Domain Block List) will be launched on March 1st, 2010. The below is taken from Spamhaus's FAQ regarding the DBL:

"What is the DBL? - The Spamhaus Domain Block List (DBL) is a realtime database of domains of spam landing pages and spam-sources, including known spammers, spam gangs, phishers, spam operations and virus/malware related services. DBL listingRead More...

Are Yahoo!'s MTA Connectivity Issues Over Yet?

Michael Weisel — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 02:57:30 +0100

There has been a small buzz growing about Yahoo!’s recent connectivity issues. Because sending to Yahoo! is so important to email marketers, I want to clarify some of the key points. For those of you who are reading this blog for the first time in a while, you may be unaware of any connectivity issues at all. So let me provide a brief recap to get everyone up to speed.

Yahoo! has been experiencing intermittent connectivity issues since January 26th, 2010. Therefore, when you sendRead More...

Mazel Tov to Goodmail and Microsoft!!

Michael Weisel — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 19:42:15 +0100

It looks as though Goodmail has inked a deal with Microsoft that will go in to effect on or around the 17th of February. This is exciting news not only for the two companies involved but email marketers (who qualify) who have had deliverability issues with Microsoft in the past. I look forward to hearing more about this as it completely develops.

Thanks @LenShneyder from Pivotal Veracity for reporting it here:

Click here For more information about becoming Goodmail cRead More...

First Yahoo, Now AOL is having Error Code Issues

Michael Weisel — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 02:41:44 +0100

AOL is currently experiencing issues which are causing incorrect error codes to be issued. This is an issue on AOL's side and they are currently working to resolve the issue as quickly as possible. We will keep you updated as soon as they have a resolution. Here is what the AOL Postmaster Blog is reporting...

"We are at present issuing a "451 4.3.0 <invaliduser@aol.com>: Temporary lookup failure" which should be read as "User not known". This is transient and weRead More...

Guess who is having low connectivity issues again?

Michael Weisel — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 02:43:25 +0100

Guess who's back, back again? Yahoo connectivity issues are back, tell a friend...

It looks as though the connectivity issue has once again reared it's ugly head for Yahoo. At least this time the SMTP error message is different (if that helps.) Our clients can follow this developing story in the Gold Lasso Client Portal. Good luck to Yahoo on getting this resolved permanently and putting this all behind them.

Below is the message that I received from the Read More...

Message, List, and Campaign Archiving now Available in Gold Lasso's eLoop

Michael Weisel — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 20:34:05 +0100

Message, List, and Campaign Archiving now Available in Gold Lasso's eLoop

Can't see this email? Click here to view in your browser.

January 27, 2009

DeRead More...

Yahoo Mail Servers Experiencing MTA Connectivity Issues Today 01/26/2010

Michael Weisel — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 23:56:04 +0100

This was posted today...

tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/ymailadmin/message/17

If you're seeing some queuing in your outbounds today when sending to Y! users, we're currently experiencing low connectivity across our MTAs, which started this morning. We're working to get things back to normal. The SMTP error message being generated by the issue should be: "420 Resources unavailable temporarily. Please try later hostname>" Our apologies for the inconvenience.

SpamAssassin Bug

Michael Weisel — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 02:04:25 +0100

Originally Posted on January 5, 2010

If you are a frequent user of the “Check for Spam” button within the editor, you may have seen a new flag causing your SPAM score to go up drastically. The test name is called “FH_DATE_PAST_20XX” (wiki.apache.org/spamassassin/Rules/FH_DATE_PAST_20XX) and comes with a 3.4 point SPAM score. The details for the test states “The date is grossly in the future.” This high score is due to a bug in the SpamAssassin Read More...

Cox Communications – Blocking URL’s Within Message Body??

Michael Weisel — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 01:58:46 +0100

I was helping a client troubleshoot a deliverability issue with Cox Communication the other day and found something very odd. The issue was that all messages being sent to @cox.net recipients was never reaching the inbox. The messages were not being bounced back so there was no bounce error to reference back to and of course without that Tech Support is less opt to help troubleshoot. The messages do not appear to be blocked for domain or IP reasons, and it doesn’t seemRead More...

Q&A: Feedback Loops and Spam Filters

Michael Weisel — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 17:21:47 +0100

We recently hosted a Q&A webinar to give our clients more information about feedback loops and spam filters — two major factors that determine the deliverability of your email campaigns. In case you missed it, here are the most common answers to your feedback and spam questions.

What is a feedback loop?

According to Wikipedia, a feedback loop is “the casual path that leads from the initial generation of the feedback signal to the subsequent modification of the evenRead More...

What’s Email Throttling — and Why Do You Need It?

Michael Weisel — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 17:17:39 +0100

What is email throttling?

Throttling is the ability to control your campaign sending at a more granular level by limiting the number of messages sent to a recipient’s mail server based on time intervals. In other words, the throttling process slows down an email on your server or through your service provider over the course of several hours.

What are the benefits?

Throttling typically results in improved deliverability and fewer bounces. But its success depends oRead More...

Quick Unorthodox Fix to the Spacer.gif Debacle

Michael Weisel — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 05:00:00 +0100

<!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:"Cambria Math"; panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:1; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-format:other; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:0 0 0 0 0 0;} @font-face {font-family:Calibri; panose-1:2 15 5 2 2 2 4 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:swiss; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:-1610611985 1073750139 0 0 159 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.Read More...

Email Rendering in Outlook 2007: What a Pain!

Michael Weisel — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 17:38:29 +0100

Anyone that has Outlook 2007 on their PC has definitely caught themselves saying “Hmmm…something doesn’t look right here.” Why, you ask? Well, it’s simple.

The Internet Explorer-based rendering engine that has always been used for viewing email, has been replaced by Microsoft Word. While Microsoft Word was used for composing email messages in Outlook, the end result of this switch was a major discrepancy between how an email looks in creation and how they appear once receRead More...

Deliverability is a Collaborative Effort

Michael Weisel — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 17:32:16 +0100

With new advanced spam filtration technology, getting email delivered to the inbox is the biggest challenge with email marketing. And contrary to a lot of sales talk, no email service provider (ESP) can guarantee deliverability. There is no magic formula or service that can guarantee to deliver your email directly to the inbox. However by following technology and list management best practices coupled with monitoring and relationship building can substantially increase your probability of reaRead More...

ISP Feedback Loops - New eLoop Feature

Michael Weisel — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 09:19:04 +0100

As you know, many ISPs include a "this is spam" button or link for a piece of email sent from a specific IP address. When clicked, it is considered a "complaint". A feedback loop (or complaint report) notes when a recipient clicks "this is spam" for one of your emails. In some cases the complaints are made directly to the hosting provider or ISP in which case Gold Lasso will alert you of these types of complaints.

These complaint reports track the feedback from your recRead More...

New Delivery Authentication Technology Rising in Popularity

Michael Weisel — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 14:12:39 +0100

DomainKeys, OpenSPF and Sender ID – if you don’t know what these things are, find out fast! Mail server authentication, both from a marketing and corporate admin standpoint, will become a necessary defense in the spam war. It is estimated that only 30 percent of mail servers currently use these email authentication technologies, but this number will grow quickly as email marketers rush to take advantage of technology that will help distinguish actual email from spam.