I’m a big fan of the tools and resources offered at Willmaster.com. Recently master programmer and company owner, Will Bontrager offered to answer a few questions about any aspect of operating a website. I asked about email.

Many moms are starting home businesses and websites and may find themselves overwhelmed with the technical aspects of operating a website and online business. Email is very important to online business success, but can present challenges for the new website owner. How does email work and what goes wrong sometimes that causes it to not be delivered?

Will’s answer:

Email can be sent from anywhere and delivered to the mailbox it is addressed to. Supposedly.

Because it is so easy to do, it has been abused. Spam has increased to the point where controls must be put into place. Those controls can cause email to disappear without notice, to be mis-filtered, to be returned for no obvious reason, to never reach its destination.

Email is an open system. The attempts to curb spam are blocks placed in that open system in an attempt to control the situation. Many of those blocks aren’t perfect, but without them the entire email system would break down, spam is that prolific.

Most legitimate email does get through. But some doesn’t.

If important email isn’t answered, a polite follow-up may be prudent.

Why is there so much spam and what can we do about it?

There is so much spam because it pays to spam. Spammers don’t spam out of the goodness of their heart or as a hobby.

It pays. Maybe it doesn’t pay in public relations or goodwill or mental health, but it does pay in money. Otherwise, it would stop.

One thing individuals can do is never to respond to spam and tell friends and acquaintances, not to respond. Responses keep the spammers going.

Other than that, controlling is is all we can hope for, at least until an effective and easy to use method of stopping it is available.

And what about mailing lists and newsletters? Is it better to use a service or should we buy a program to install on our own server?

The answer is subjective. For newsletters and periodical business-to-customer email that’s highly valued by the recipients, the email will probably get through okay, most of the time. When the email is wanted, subscribers will white-list as instructed and tend to complain to their ISP if they don’t get their email — especially if informed that such action can help. Such attention can also be beneficial for delivery of other email, as the address is already white-listed and ISPs may already have the word that your email is okay.

On the other hand, if the mailings tend to be annoying, they are more likely to be reported as spam. Then, the IP address the email is being sent from can be blocked in the various black lists maintained by anti-spam groups and which ISPs can subscribe to. In that case, it may be prudent to use a service of high repute and let them deal with delivery problems.

The B-Mailer software is relatively inexpensive for sending newsletters and emails to lists. Yet, it probably has all the features you really need. It can be installed on your server. You have full control of it.

Aweber Communications is at or near the top of the list for emailing services of its kind.

————-
For more great tips read other interviews with Will and ask your own questions about building a successful website at
http://www.squidoo.com/AskWill