Avoiding Spam Keywords and Their Origins

Has your marketing email ever been delivered to the junk folder? While sender reputation is the most common and likely cause, spam keywords are another factor in the equation that can trigger a spam filter to block or junk your email. Spam filters will check for specific keywords like “free” or “no credit check” both in the subject and body of your email and calculate a score based on the severity and combination of words used.  The context of spam keywords can increase their weight in the equation as well. For example, use of the words “all” or “new” may not have any impact, but combine them into the phrase “all new” and it may add to the likelihood that your email will be flagged as spam.

The list of keywords that get flagged is always being updated and can vary from one inbox provider to the next. Before the dawn of the ubiquitous Nigerian Prince Scam, the word “Nigerian” was probably fine. Now it’s a highly weighted spam keyword.  Words get flagged because they are correlated with spam, but the words themselves are not really the target – spam filters aim to flag spam-like behavior and ultimately identify unwanted email. For example, starting an email with “Dear {Firstname}” would be an unusually formal introduction for a marketing email if the recipient had actually provided explicit permission, and likely indicates the lack of an existing relationship between the sender and the recipient. To this end, keywords from the latest scam, certain industries, and “clever sales tactics” will eventually become flagged when they are associated with unwanted email.

Addressing the Root Cause

As you examine your own templates, don’t just avoid the spam keywords, be sure to avoid the underlying behavior as well. The goal is not just to make sure your emails don’t appear to be spam, but to make sure they are not spam, in any way, shape, or form. Scams and spam tend to be overly persuasive because there’s no real value underpinning their offering, so you can differentiate yourself from the textbook profile of spam by engaging in industry standard best practices and focusing on providing valuable information about your product or service.

Suppose you ran a completely legitimate Nigerian lottery, marketing it via email would always be an uphill battle. If your industry uses keywords commonly associated with spam, you should try to limit their use in email. Knowingly using spam keywords comes with inherent risk, so you’ll also need to make sure your other reputation factors are squeaky clean, as you’ll effectively be afforded less leeway by spam filters.

Below is an example list of spam keywords for reference. If these words appear in abundance in your templates, be sure to remove not only the keywords but also consider why these words or phrases are in your template to begin with.

Spam Keywords