Managing and Reducing Email Bounces

Email messages may not reach the recipients and return to the sender for quite different reasons. As a rule the returned email generated by the mail server contains the description of the error that caused the delivery failure. Based on those errors bounced emails are divided into two types: soft bounces and hard bounces. What is the difference between them?

A soft bounce is an email message that returns to the sender due to some temporary reasons: busy mailbox, blocked domain, mailbox full, account temporary down, network busy, mailbox over limit, etc. If after several attempts to deliver such a message, it still bounces, a soft bounce email is classified as hard bounce.

Hard bounces are permanently undeliverable email messages. The causes are invalid addresses (email or domain name doesn't exist, spelling errors), or the mail server has blocked your server, or filtered emails and returned them as hard bounced.

Dealing with bounced emails after each mailing campaign is critical for every reputable marketer. Here are some quick tips you can follow to minimize the number of bounces, reduce email delivery costs, and increase conversion rates of your email campaign:

- Check emails in your list for validity.

- Confirm email addresses.

- Include "Edit Your Account" link into your emails.

- Check the blacklists and assure that neither you nor your ISP is blacklisted.

- Remove Spam Trap addresses from your list.

- Send a test message to yourself.