Hello World ! Welcome to this 2ème article of February where I'll talk about an e-mail address often abandoned ... The well named ... Reply address! Even today, unfortunately, I still see reply addresses with an alias "noreply". There we already know that any reply to the e-mail will not be answered... And it's a shame because this reply address could allow you to boost your reputation... More below!
E-mailing is a two-way communication channel: An advertiser communicates with a recipient and the latter has the possibility to answer. So far so good?! But some advertisers have forgotten this concept and use the e-mail channel in a unilateral way: understand "I'm talking to you but don't talk to me". Well... Nice mistake! Simply because interactions between a sender and a recipient are perceived as positive behaviors. And yes! And know that the more there is, the more it will serve your reputation!
What is a reply address???
The reply address is the e-mail address that will be used when a recipient clicks on the reply button of his e-mail. Generally, it is the advertiser who defines this address in his routing tool (and therefore it is customizable).
If it is not defined, the sender address will be used as the reply address. Its choice is important because it will have a strong impact on the vision your recipients will have of your brand. There is nothing more annoying when you finally contact a brand (via the reply address) and they don't answer you... And yes, your recipients have things to tell you 😉
Why manage your reply address?
As I said above, your recipients will at some point have things to say to you, so why not listen to them? They could for example :
- Report a technical or personalization problem... => This would allow you to update the person's profile and thus improve your targeting in the next campaign.
- To report a dissatisfaction about a too strong commercial pressure... => This would allow you to unsubscribe the person directly and to test a more restrictive commercial pressure.
- To report a non-opt-in and/or irrelevant solicitation... => This would allow you to avoid a complaint and to test other types of content or to re-optinize part of the addresses.
- Ask for additional information to the received e-mail... => This would allow you to establish a positive exchange with the person and to optimize your contents on the next campaign.
Moreover, these exchanges, if they are beneficial (beware, there are unfortunately some madmen), would allow you to establish a lasting dialogue with the person and why not restore the image of your brand to these recipients not always happy.
One thing is sure, you will have everything to gain! Optimize your targeting, have better content, avoid complaints and send a strong positive signal to your users (I repeat myself but there is nothing more annoying than talking in a vacuum...).
And on top of that, these dialogues are a positive signal for your reputation because you will show ISPs/Webmails that you have one-to-one exchanges with your recipients (and if they play the game and answer it's even better) but they are also a strong signal sent to your recipients.
What are the requirements for a reply address?
The "Best Practices" on the use and management of a reply-to address are quite simple to set up but will require a little gymnastics. These BP are defined in four actions:
- Find out who will manage the reply address: You ? The marketing team? The customer service department? It can quickly become a point of contention if this one is generic 😉
- Find the right alias : the alias is the name before @ of an address. Here, we will avoid "nepasreply", "noreply", ... At Badsender, we use "yesreply".
- Configuring an MX server : crucial! Without a mail server, it is impossible to receive and send e-mails. It is your IT department that you will have to contact.
- Filtering, surveying and responding Three in one! First of all, you have to set up filters to delete all "out of office" e-mails, then you have to read (or consult) all the other e-mails received and finally you have to answer quickly to the reports and/or requests.
Some people may be afraid to manage this reply address for various reasons: more time to allocate to a new task, too many e-mails to manage, etc. Don't be afraid, stay positive!
The "noreply" war!!!
In 2012, Jonathan via Badsender launched the #noreplywar! The goal was to ban the alias "noreply" (noreply@domaine.com) of any email address (sending or responding) to allow each consumer to be able to respond to a communication to create a discussion between them and the brand.
This is how the alias "yesreply" was born!
Need help?
Reading content isn't everything. The best way is to talk to us.
Conclusion...
If you haven't already thought about this, it would be a good idea, after reading this article, to think about a strategy on how to use and manage your reply address and the possibilities it can offer you. And if you don't do it now, you'll never do it! Hence the interest in talking to you about it in this 2nd article on the Good Resolutions of 2021!
Even if an anti-spam filter won't punish you for using a "noreply", the recipient will be less understanding about not being able to answer you... In short, think about it 🙂
—–
Tell us everything, do you use a "real" reply address or are you still at "noreply"???
Do you need help? We can help you with your delivery issues but also with your e-mailing strategies.
—–
Please feel free to like, comment, share this article! Any comments are welcome 🙂
—–
My last articles published on the blog:
- BR 2021 #01 | Collecting email addresses to boost your reputation!
- Tech #01 | Monitoring DMARC Badsender.com - January 2021
—–
Photo by Jason Rosewell on Unsplash
