I’ve always found AWeber to be reputable and a good source for marketing tools, but their spam reporting tool is one that you should never, ever use.
I mean look at the description of the tool; it’s almost hard to believe that a company would describe a tool that way. Here’s what AWeber has to say about their spam reporting tool:
A quick note about the title of this blog post.
The title is a bit of a tongue-in-cheek take on the fact that most companies give you something to use for free but require you to spam them with unwanted emails to access their full functionality. In other words, it’s a play on words.
But what I really want to focus on here is the fact that AWeber’s description of their spam reporting tool is dead wrong. A spam reporting tool is not a “tool” that you use to report spam. It’s a “tool” that you use to block spam. If you’re in a browser, you need to type in your email address in the form that most email clients provide (usually at the bottom of every email). After you’ve typed in your email address, you click on the “Spam” button above the email client’s signature block.
So, when a company tells you that they provide a spam blocking tool and requires you to use it in order to access the full functionsality of their product, you should immediately refuse the offer. You should never use a spam checking tool because those tools are only designed to check if you’re doing or saying something that will get you blocked by a third party (i.e. a spam blocking tool).
Why You Should Never Use AWeber’s Spam Reporting Tool
So, let’s dig into what AWeber gets wrong about their spam reporting tool and how you should really use it. Firstly, and most importantly, VERY few if any of AWeber’s clients will seriously consider using a spam reporting tool because it’s not designed for that. It’s designed to be used with a free email client like MailChimp or Mandrill to confirm that you are not a spammer. If you want to use a spam reporting tool with AWeber, you’re going to have to pay for it.
You Need To Use A Free Email Client To Use AWeber’s Spam Reporting Tool
In order to use AWeber’s spam reporting tool, you first need to have a free email client. You can’t use AWeber’s spam reporting tool with MailChimp, Mandrill, or any other paid service. If you want to check if you’re getting spam in an email from AWeber, you’re going to have to open up your free email client and type in your email address at the bottom of the email. Then, you click on the “Spam” button above the signature block. If the email comes from a competitor, you’ll see a small message appear in your email client notifying you that the email is spam.
You Should Only Report Spam To The Email Provider
Another fatal mistake that AWeber makes is that they report all emails that they think are spam. Remember, they are just checking to see if you are a spammer. Therefore, it’s not an accurate or a complete report. If you want to report spam, you should only report it to the email provider. You can’t blame the company if the email that you’re reporting is genuinely spam. So, if you want to be sure that you’re blocking all spam, you simply have to report the emails to the email provider. It’s not a scam, it’s just that the product is not ready for sale.