EP 76: 6 Ways To Avoid The Spam Folder and Recession Proof Your Business
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My name is Joanne Bolt, and I am intent on helping women stop playing small in their businesses, get out of the messy middle, and into profitability.

I'm a Southern mama with a snarky attitude who built a $56 million real estate empire just to prove I could, and now I work from home and run a seven-figure immersive coaching business, all while sipping coffee in my fuzzy slippers. Together, we'll uncover the tried and true tactics to building a business you love while giving you the real deal on how to make them work for you so that you can get out of your way and into action.

Is it all rainbows and unicorns? No way. So put your big girl panties on and get ready because we'll dive into it all from failures to success to money and emotions and everything in between. Think of this as your girlfriend's guide to business. Grab your coffee or pour yourself a punch bowl of wine because this is the B Word Podcast.

Hey friends, and welcome back to the B word. I am your host, Joanne Bolt, and I want to take a second right now and ask you to get honest with yourself. Like right now, right this minute, right here, many of you are scared to death about an impending recession. Now, if you're in a service-based business like real estate, this recession is occurring as you are more than likely going into a slow season.

Or if you're in a product-based business of selling things, you might be excited by the upcoming holiday season. If you're listening to this episode, when it drops live, it's November, the week before Thanksgiving. But you know that as soon as the holidays are over, you may be hitting your slow season. And a recession makes every business owner nervous.

But I love this opportunity for you to jump back into your business, evaluate what's been working and what hasn't been working, and really double down on some of the tried and true traditional methods that got you to where you are today or that you need to go back and reinvest some time in.

And one of those that I highly encourage is list building. You could call it your database. That's fine. Tomato, tomato. I don't really care. But at the end of the day, how big your list is directly correlates to the amount of revenue that you make.

but only if you're actually using it. If you have a massive list that you never engage with, it doesn't do you any good. And if you have a small and mighty list that you engage with regularly, it's amazing what it can do. However,

Before you jump right back into your list and start creating those emails that you've been avoiding writing because you don't know what to do with them, I want you to pause for a minute here and go into your own spam or junk folders and see how many emails have landed there just this morning alone.

You do not want to have done all the work in creating great templates and great emails just to land in no man's land. So how do we avoid the dreaded spam flag by your potential or past client's email service provider? I've got a couple of suggestions for you to follow, but before we get to those, let's talk about a few things to put into play so you maintain a healthy list.

Take a look at how dirty your list or database is. I know that's a funny term to use, but I say it all the time. Is it time to clean out your database? I want you to grab your calendar right now and put in a repeating event every five months to go ahead and clean out that list. And by cleaning it out, I mean delete from it.

I can personally tell you that I have the Real Boss Women list cleaned up actually weekly. I am so passionate about keeping my database clean. Yes, I just told you that. Go ahead, cringe some here, but then join me in hitting the delete button for subscribers who have unsubscribed or marked you as spam or just plain opted out. Don't hyperventilate on me as I say this. I know you may be looking at your list right now thinking, but Joanne,

You're asking me to delete out over half of it. That's okay, because we're going to move forward from this point. However, if you're really nervous, you can export that list and keep it in cloud storage if it makes you feel any better. Kind of like keeping last year's outfits in the back of your closet, knowing you're probably never going to wear them again. However, I do really feel strongly that having a list full of people who have said no to your emails is

It is not serving you, friend. It gives you a false sense of how big your database actually is. And why would you want to not have a true and accurate look at, you know, where your list is? Now, once you've hit the delete button to remove the wasteful subscribers, it's time to engage the ones who just plain not been active. This preserves the healthiness of your list and will help you push those dreaded spam flags away.

So if you haven't created an email sequence meant to re-engage your subscribers who haven't opened or clicked a link in six months or more, take some time now over the holidays or when you're in your slow season and work on that. I find that it's best to just ask a simple question, inviting them to click a link if they want to be removed totally. I mean, let's just talk about the elephant in the room. If they don't want to be on your list, you should know that.

Your intention was never to be intrusive in their inbox or bore them or junk up their emails. So inviting them to opt out gives them permission to do so. And it makes you not look like you're consistently sending emails to people and having it bounce. And that helps you not land in the blacklist zone for emails. Whew.

Okay, so that was some mind-blowing maintenance information, and I am well aware of it. In fact, I'll wager you've probably never been told to actively delete out dead emails or to re-engage the non-active ones. The name of the game is I've always seen and been taught is add, add, add to your database, grow your list. And I'm a huge proponent of that. But you've probably never been told that sometimes you do need to subtract from that list.

This is a practice I've done for years, folks. I mean, I just told you I do it on the weekly. I've tested it. I've lived and breathed it. And now it's time for you to start following this rule as well. I promise you it's worth it.

always be cleaning out that dirty database. It is the best way to stay out of spam land. And also, if you really look at the analytics and take a look at which emails you're sending out that cause the most unsubscriptions, you can get an idea of what your audience likes to have land in their inbox and what they don't. And that can help you create super engaging emails.

Now, regardless of how clean you keep your list, trust me, you may still be flagged as spam if you don't avoid a few other things. So let me break them down for you. Avoid spam trigger words and excessive punctuation. I've been guilty of this in the past. So again, this is a lesson that I am imparting into you. One that I learned myself. Words like free, all in caps, letters with an exclamation mark, or you won, you

or you're a winner! Act now. I promise and no obligation. Those will trigger the dreaded spam filter gods.

My realtor friends, you guys are probably very frequent flyers in this category. A free comparative market analysis or no obligation consultations are not what your subject should ever say. In fact, just remove them from your email sequences altogether. Your drip campaigns should never say them because spoiler alert, nobody actually wants them.

If you need a guiding compass to determine if you've thrown in a trigger word, then I want you to think about this always. If you would roll your own eyes or immediately think of a used car salesperson when you read your own subject line, the spam filters will probably do the same and send your emails to the spam folder. Okay, don't shoot the messenger on this one. And trust me, I can't believe I have to point it out either. But guys, check your spelling.

We've all gotten a little too dependent on seeing those squiggly lines under words when we type them. And we often don't bother to go back and do a simple check to make sure our words sound grammatically correct or are spelled correctly. We make the assumption our autocorrect will do it for us. But just like if I read your email and you spell things wrong, I'm going to consider you a nonprofessional and

Your spam bots will do the same. They think it's computer generated and will potentially flag it as spam if you don't just do this simple 30 second check on your spelling and grammar. Here's another valuable tool that I learned over the years to avoid that spam filter. Create clickable emails.

I used to think an email was something to be read only, potentially to hit the reply button back and, you know, send a fast response. Well, that's true if I'm emailing my mom with a recipe for Thanksgiving. Hey mom, here you go. Here's the recipe for my gravy.

But for salespeople, and you are one, by the way, having an email that a subscriber clicks a link or button to take action is even more important than the simple act of having them open the email. In fact, I would challenge you to start looking at your click rates as one of the KPIs you implement into your business. The click rate may be more important than the open rate.

but you'll never get the click rate if you don't get the open rate. Why do we need those clickable emails? Well, to start off with, it shows engagement between you and the subscriber. Let's compare that to what you're probably super well aware of by now, which is social media. Social media, the name alone says the word social. It is meant to look at if you and the person looking at the content you create enjoy each other's material. Do you talk back and forth?

One of the things that algorithms for social media really take a hard look at are if you post something and people comment on it. And they're really, really, really looking at if you take the time to respond to their comments. Why? Because social media algorithms are computer generated.

They have no clue if you're actually friends in real life. So when someone comments on your stuff or shares it or saves it, and you then land in their DMs or comment back on their comments or, you know, create a social atmosphere back and forth between the two of you, the algorithms think that you enjoy each other's comments and they are more likely to put your material at the top of the list for whoever it is that's engaging with you on your social media.

Now come back with me here for a second. It's no different from emails. It's just a little bit different in how the algorithms work.

When you create content in your emails that your subscribers click on, then you're less likely to get flagged as spam because the systems that are reading the emails realize that your people open the email, read it and engaged with it. That's why your clickable stuff is so important. It also for you as a sales entrepreneur, it increases the no like and trust factor because

Your audience doesn't want to get emails that they only read because it takes them 30 seconds and then they forget about it and it goes out of their brain. When you create stuff that they can click on, they get more involved with you. It shows them how knowledgeable you are in something and they probably

start to look forward to your emails versus ignoring them. Finding those clickable emails creates engagement, increases the know, like, and trust factor. And overall, it's just a darn good thing to pay attention to. Now that I've totally intrigued you with this concept, I'm going to take a second and dig a little bit deeper because I can practically hear in your heads, what are clickable emails? What should I put into my emails to get people to click?

Here's a couple of examples. You could put a discount code for something. You could include a link to register for an event you're hosting, a free download, a podcast episode to go and listen to, or heck, even a book on Audible that you think your audience should check out. To create an even better click rate, I highly recommend using segmentation in your database and only send out emails to relevant subscribers. For example,

When I opened registration for next year's focus conference in February of 2023, the first thing I did was send out an email to past conference attendees. I knew that they had attended the past focus conference in 2022 because I had tagged them as such. These people are highly likely to want to attend the next one. So I didn't send out an email to my entire database. I sent it just to them.

Now, if there are any spots left for the focus 2023, the next email that will go out is to subscribers who I've segmented and tagged with the events tag.

These are subscribers who've raised their hands to be notified of upcoming events. Again, I'm sending out a clickable email only to the people that I feel want to open it before I ever try to send it out to everyone because I don't want to be flagged as spam. Lastly, if you're trying to avoid that almighty spam filter, provide an unsubscribe option. Trust me, I can't believe I have to say this either again, but...

The spam gods keep changing the rules as legislation changes and people's preferences and tolerances evolve. And so this actually is a legality. You have got to provide an unsubscribe option.

I'm not an attorney, but I do believe you can get in some legal trouble if you don't. Irregardless of that though, holy forking shirt balls, there is nothing more obnoxious than receiving emails you never ask for and not being able to get off that dang list. You guys know I am the queen of unsubscribing to emails I don't want in my inbox, which is probably why I'm also a very loud champion of creating emails that your ideal client actually wants. So hear me when I say this.

not only will you land yourself in junk folders, but

or potentially in some legal trouble if you choose to ignore this, but you are guaranteeing if you don't put one in there, people will start marking you as spam and you'll be wasting your time sending out emails. So put your big girl panties on folks, resist the temptation to get your feelings hurt when someone clicks on subscribe and allow them to do so with grace and ease. You know what makes me smile the most when I see it?

It's when an email gives me the option to opt out of some sequences, but not all of them. And in fact, stay on their list. That way, if I do want to keep hearing from you about, I don't know, something like a podcast, but I don't want to keep getting emails about open houses or a course you're selling, then I can say, take me off of this, but keep me on this. It

It allows me to self-select what I want to hear from you about, and that makes my experience with you as a brand or company even stronger. So bear that in mind when you utilize your unsubscribe buttons. If your email platform or provider has the ability to segment from the unsubscribe link,

Then utilize it to its fullest extent. It's there for a reason. Your subscribers will thank you and I bet you'll have less spam flags thrown out at you. And that's really part of the name of the game. Okay, so we've talked about how to not have your emails land in no man's land. You may actually be sitting here thinking, yeah, Joe, you're right. We need to engage and really dive into building that database or building that list and learning how to utilize it for profit.

Cool. I've got you covered. I mean, I always have your back friends. I've created a course just for you. It is called list building for a profit. And in it, I walk you through how to start building your list, how to grow your list. If you've already started building it. And even more importantly, modern techniques on how to utilize that list.

what kind of emails you should and should not be sending out because we don't want to create more junk in the inbox world. Can I get an amen on that? Yep. I bet you just silently clapped with me because I know that I did. Go to realbosswomen.com forward slash list building, and I'll meet you there for the course.

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