Source code… Some people have no need while others live off of being able to access the source, make adjustments, and work with the product source directly.

We develop software to extend your business, improve your operations, and ultimately help you succeed.  With each new update we are constantly thinking about how you could further utilize & customize the solution to fit your specific needs.  From our central language file, Smarty template files, CSS files, and more you have been able to customize & tweak our products.

We have a lot of changes taking place here with 1-2-All 5.0, the latest version of KB just released, and SupportTrio 3.0 in development.  As part of these new updates we are also implementing a very significant change… Including full source code with all of our products.  That means there are no more zend or ioncube requirements.  Our commitment to ensure security of our intellectual property does remain – but we have managed to come up with a solution that forms a great balance between licensing and being able to customize the product as much as you would like.  As of today all products are now available with the source included.

We hope you will find this change and our future changes to benefit you and if you should have any feedback at any time please let us know!

A sender’s reputation can follow not only an IP address but a brand and a sending domain.   A holistic approach is necessary when considering a sender’s reputation as no one factor alone determines what that reputation is.  Reputation can be broadly defined as the opinion of a community toward an object.  Knowing what the community looks for when determining a reputation will allow you to maximize your delivery rates.

Spamtraps

We first eluded to spamtraps when we discussed Paid Subscriber Lists. A spamtrap is an email address that appears to be valid but is in fact used by ISPs to catch spammers. You will sometimes hear these referred to as “honey pots.”  Spammers use harvesting programs which scan millions of web pages looking for email addresses.  These email addresses may come from old email addresses which are recycled by ISPs in order to catch commercial emailers that use old, rented, or paid subscriber lists.  Some sites bury email addresses in their source code so that they are picked up by harvesting programs.  The company where the email originated is then alerted to any incoming emails that go to that address at which time they contact your web host and file a spam complaint.  Spam traps are bad news.   Its been reported that your delivery rate can drop as many as 20 points drop with one spam trap hit.   Spamtraps are one of many factors that ISPs look at when calculating your sender reputation.   Not only is your delirability affected but they can result in temporary or long term blocks.

Good list maintenance is necessary for avoiding spam traps.   Here are some things you will need to avoid:

• Poor List Sources -  This includes avoiding paid subscriber lists as mentioned previously
• List Poisoning – Using confirmation Opt-In mailings will reduce the chances that you will receive invalid email addresses
• List Aging -  Because spam traps are often used by recycling old email addresses use bounce management to remove any old email addresses and also remove any inactive addresses from your list.

Sender Authentication

This is used to prevent domain forgery and spoofing and provides a framework for helping ISPs to distinguish between legitimate email senders and spammers.  ISPs Identifying and verifying a claimed domain name has been authenticated or authorized for sending from a MTA makes it possible to treat suspected forgeries with suspician,  reject known forgeries, and block email addresses from known spamming domains.

• Sender Policy Framework (SPF) – a record that allows you to determine which computers can send emails on behalf of your domain.  Adding an SPF record to your domain name’s TXT entry, while not required, can help improve email delivery rates by reducing the chance that the emails you send will be seen as spam.  It can also help prevent others from sending spam and using your domain name.  This is used by Bellsouth, AOL, Gmail, and MSN/Hotmail.
• Sender ID – is very similar to SPF record except this extends the verification process to include the purported responsible address included in the header.  Used by MSN/Hotmail
• Domain Keys – an authentication standard that is designed to verify the DNS domain of email sender and the message integrity.  All outgoing emails are digitally signed with a private encryption key to match a public key that is published in the sender’s DNS record.   Used by Gmail, Yahoo, SBCGlobal, British Telecom, Rogers Cable, Rocket Mail, etc.
• DKIM – an enhanced authentication standard that allows a person to verify that a message comes from the domain that it claims that it came from.

Getting Technical

Your system admin should be able to assist you with ensuring that the following technical configurations are in line as they can improve or harm your sender reputation.

• IP Address – because email originates from this address you need to establish a low history of spam complaints, spamtrap hits, and low bounce rates in order to have a positive reputation that will affect your long term deliverability.   If you wish to qualify for whitelists, feedback loops, and reputation services, your IP address must have low spam complaints, unsubscription management, and proper setup for the domain associated with it.
• Sending Domain or Subdomain – Domain registration and domain age are two factors for establishing a positive reputation.  Newly registered domains are regarded with suspicion as spammers often hop from domain to domain.  If a sending domain has a bad online reputation it will result in low deliverability rates.
• RFC Compliance – these are information documents used as governing standards for internet traffic.   RFC 2821: Simple Mail Transfer Protocol and RFC 282: Internet Message Formatare relate to email reputation.
• Reverse DNS – used to identify the domain name associated with an IP address.  The IP address is the only data that can not be forged and not having this enabled is in violation of RFC standards and a requirement for many ISPs.  If this is not enabled or is configured improperly you must immediately contact your server admin.
• Bounce Management – An email address is considered dead and should be removed from your list if it bounces 3 consecutive times or if the time between the most recent consecutive delivery rejection is in excess of 15 days.

Where to Go From Here

The final way to improve your deliverability is to get certified or accredited by a reputable organization.   There are three different types of ways to get yourself certified!  The first gets your emails automatically whitelisted or delivered to ISPs and companies that are working with the relevent program.  Another audits your email practices so that you can display a seal of approval next to your sign up form.   Another allows you to display an icon next to your email in your inbox that indicates that your email passed a quality test.  We will focus on whitelisting programs here:

• Goodmail Systems -  ISPs supporting this program ensure delivery with a “certified” icon attached.  This accreditation is supported by Yahoo and AOL.
• Sender Score Certified – Acceptance in this program puts you on the whitelist that includes 240 email address as well as MSN/Hotmail and Roadrunner.
• Habeas – requires business processes and email practices.   Their safelist is support by many email receivers including AOL, Earthlink, Google, and MSN
• SuretyMail – While not technically a whitelist a large number of ISPs, spam filters, and mail servers take this accreditation into account when making delivery decisions.  Senders with this accreditation will see improved delivery.

If you are concerned about whether you have already been blacklisted you can go here.

If this sounds like a bad idea to you, then it’s because it is.   If you are a new email marketer this may sound like a good idea to you.   Building a list of subscribers takes time and you found someone that’s promising you quick results by selling you entire lists of emails addresses from people that they claim were targeted, verified,  opted- in,  and clean.

Stop.  Just think about what you are doing.

You’re getting a whole bunch of email addresses, from people that never gave you permission to have them in the first place, so that you can send mailings that they never asked for.    How is that different from spam?   Not only are you wasting money on bad prospects but you are setting yourself up for nothing but trouble.

Here are some consequences you are likely to face:

• You will receive complaints to your ISP which will result in your company being disconnected. At the least you will experience dramatically reduced email delivery rates.
• You will find yourself blacklisted and no ISP will want you as a customer.
• You will be prosecuted as there are laws against this here in the US and many places abroad.
• Your reputation as a company will suffer and no one will want to buy what you are selling.
• No one will take your mailing seriously,  it will go straight in the trash, where it will never be read
• Most of your emails will bounce causing mail server congestion and your ISP will fire you.

Don’t fall into a “spam trap” by responding to an unsolicited email from so called “list brokers” claiming to offer you targeted lists of subscribers.   These emails were either purchased from spammers or collected using harvesting programs that scan sites for email addresses so they can be dumped in a database.

To combat this some sites bury email addresses in their source code so that they are picked up by harvesting programs.  The company where the email originated is then alerted to any incoming emails that go to that address at which time they contact your web host and file a spam complaint.   This leaves you not only subject to being cut off by your hosting provider but it also leaves you open to prosecution.

You can purchase an email list from either buying or renting.   When you rent an email address you are not given the email address and your mailing is sent on behalf of you.    When you buy a list you receive subscriber details, etc.   You’re more likely to find a reputable rental service that does not offer subscriber details than you are to purchase a list of email addresses that you can use to send out your own mailings.  Companies that sell subscriber details should be approached with extreme caution.

If you do purchase then you will have to ensure that your mailing does not contain the following:

• False or misleading header information
• Deceptive subject lines
• Your mailing has an opt-out method
• Your commercial mailing is identified as an advertisement and has the sender’s physical postal address

If you do a paid subscriber list and have ensured that your mailing is compliant with local laws governing unsolicited mailings be sure to tweak your expectations.    You can’t expect much from people that have not opted-in to your list and may have never heard of you.   Adjust your expectations accordingly.   Its better to take the long view and collect your mailings through subscription forms and  opt-in email confirmations.    Your list will take some time to grow, but by ensuring the integrity of your list,  your list will be worth a whole lot more.

Help Desk 3.0 development has begun….

We recently started work on Help Desk 3.0.  Version 3.0 will be a major update to the ActiveCampaign Help Desk Software package.

We will be incorporating hundreds of changes and additions including such things as:

• Rewriting the majority of the backend code
• Improving the speed and responsiveness of the entire application
• Leaving 99% of the source code unencoded
• CSS Based admin/public interfaces
• Escalation system
• SLA Management
• External Login Sources
• Much more….

While we have our development plans – we still want to know what you want to see in Help Desk 3.0.

Let us know what you want changed, what you wish was added, general feedback & comments, etc… Your feedback is greatly appreciated and will be taken into consideration for Help Desk 3.0.

Tell us what you want in the next version of SupportTrio!

There are some exciting changes occurring at ActiveCampaign. We have a number of new updates in the works, KnowledgeBuilder 3.0 is about to be released into beta testing, and we are making some changes in the way you are able to customize all ActiveCampaign products.

The ability to customize ActiveCampaign products is of great concern to us. Customizing sections of the software can be crucial for the product to fit a specific use or direction. Throughout the years we have increased options such as easy branding settings, smarty templates, central language files, a selection of unencoded files, and more. And now….

All future major updates of ActiveCampaign products will be 99% unencoded.

You will be able to modify each and every part of our product. The less than 1% of files that will be encoded only takes care of installing, upgrading, and general licensing. The need for Zend or Ioncube support will remain – but it will not hinder your customization efforts.

We hope this will assist our clients who need custom solutions and are excited to start releasing the major updates of all products with the new 99% unencoded format.

P.S. The first product to be released 99% unencoded will be KnowledgeBuilder 3.0

As many of you may be aware – we have talked a lot about opening up some areas to allow for easier customizations along with the ability to retain certain customizations with upgrades. We have some exciting features and options coming in the future. The ability to easily upgrade without losing style and code changes is yet to come – but now you can access the majority of the source code for the public sections of Email Marketing, Help Desk, and Live Chat.

What does this mean? You now have access to the source code of the public pages / functions. You can now directly modify the subscriber add/edit functions, or work on the archive page for Email Marketing. Or you can adjust the ticket submit code in Help Desk. Or change how the Live Chat chat code works to authenticate and authorize a chat. The possibilities for customizations are endless.

To view a specific list of files/folders that have been unencoded click on one of the following links:

• Unencoded files in Email Marketing
• Unencoded files in Help Desk
• Unencoded files in Live Chat

As mentioned above – this is only the start of a number of new changes coming to our entire product line. Just let us know if you have any questions, comments, or feedback along the way!