The following article was written by Mark Rushworth, self proclamined web design, SEO and internet marketing guru.

Reduce Spam – 10 Top Tips to Stop Spam

Here are 10 top tips to reduce spam in your email in-box.

1. Delete/turn off your catch-all.

   Catch-all’s are generic mail boxes that collect all email not being sent to a named account. The up-side of catch-alls is that if someone spells an email address correctly then you still have a chance to access the message. The down side is that automated mailers send emails to randomuser@yourdomain.com. So by removing your catch-all email account you will stop a majority of junk messages.

   [Blue Pixel Design Hosting accounts have the Default Address set to ":fail: No Such User Here" by default.  This can be set to forward to your main email address instead, but of course, as mentioned above, might increase your spam levels.]

2. Make sure that you don’t publish personal email addresses on your website.

   Automated systems ‘trawl’ websites looking for email addresses, adding them to lists without your permission. If you do want to publish a personal email address disguise it using javascript or as an image (these will be inaccessible and stop some disabled viewers from emailing you), or even better, replace the email address with a contact form allowing you to pre-qualify enquiries by asking detailed questions or giving a choice of specific variables.
    

3. Set up a generic email address for use on forums, registration pages and other situations where you know that you may be opening yourself up to receiving spam email.
    
4. Don’t use single names i.e. fred@ for your email address.

   Again, these addresses can be guessed and within a few minutes a flood of spam begins to arrive. Instead opt for firstname.surname@. An added benefit is that it makes sure your contacts really know who you are.

   [I'm not sure how much difference this is going to make, and use my own name in my email.]

5. Don’t use sales@ support@ or any other guessable addresses for the same reason as above.

   Instead come up with your own codes for online contact forms etc. As they’re being accessed through a form and don’t need to be entered manually – you can really go wild with these.
    

6. Register a dedicated email domain.

   It may be a bit extreme, but if spam becomes so unmanageable, it may be worthwhile registering a completely different address to email from. This could be name@emailcompanyname.com.
    

7. Use an email program with integrated spam filtering.

   Outlook (not express) has limited in-built spam filtering. A better option would be to use Mozilla’s free email program Thunderbird, which automatically tags possible spam for you. A great feature of Thunderbird is you can set the default view to show all messages marked as not-spam, which dramatically reduces the amount of clutter and enables you to toggle between spammy and non spammy views.

   [The link to download Thunderbird: http://www.mozilla.com/thunderbird/  or visit their main site at http://www.mozilla.com and download Firefox as well and rid yourself of the evil that is Internet Explorer!]

8. Ask your host what spam filtering packages they offer.

   [Included in your cPanel is the MailScanner.  It's here that you can set the filters higher to catch more spam.  See our post on how to increase your spam filter levels for instructions on how to do this.]
    

9. Subscribe to a mailing preference service.

   There are a number of mailing preference services out there that operate as closed email networks. In order to send a message to a member of these systems, you have to register on the website and provide proof that you are who you say you are. As someone who wants to send a simple message, this can be pretty hard going, with lots of forms to fill in; but as a recipient, you know that all messages being delivered are from authentic sources.
    

10. Don’t send bulk emails using TO or CC.

    If you’re sending the latest Friday Funny, or a quick promotional offer to friends and/or colleagues, don’t use TO or CC. These types of email have tendancy to be passed on to persons unknown, the result is that everyone you’ve listed as an original recipient could be easily added to a list by an unscrupulous individual. What makes this worse is that not only are the original recipients easily visible, but also the subsequent chain(s) of people.

Original post by Mark Rushworth can be found at http://www.markrushworth.com/template_permalink.asp?id=102.

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