MainSleaze

Dr. Rich Pfeiffer at Growth Central, a specialist in anger management training who offers classes and workshops, has sent a permission pass to his spamtrap-laden list. The permission pass was sent by ESP ExactTarget. Responses are directed to a URL at a different ESP, Streamsend.

This permission pass strikes the right note:

• It explicitly asks for the user to opt-in, and explicitly states that if the user does not, he or she will not receive further email.
• It explains what the newsletter is and provides enough information that a user who subscribed should recognize it.
• It sounds matter-of-fact, inviting without being a hard sell.

Dr. Pfeiffer had been hitting a few of my spamtraps for many months. I briefly mentioned this back in February in a catchall blog. I just searched my spamtrap archives, and found a series of spams from him sent from a third ESP, Your Mailing List Provider (YMLP), a smaller mostly self-service ESP with very little tolerance for spam. Since Dr. Pfeiffer’s mailings hit several of my spamtraps, I suspect that they generated quite a few complaints. That likely accounts for Dr. Pfeiffer having moved to a new ESP; YMLP would not put up with a list that generated repeated complaints.

Those complaints are probably also behind Dr. Pfeiffer’s decision to repermission his list. That should not be a surprise to me or to anybody, but it is. Many companies with dirty mailing lists who spam and then face complaints are too careless or too stubborn to learn from the experience, preferring to blame the complainers or anybody but themselves for their problems and taking no action to fix those problems. Dr. Pfeiffer apparently is not one of them. That bodes well, both for his continued ability to market in email, and (I think) for the quality of the classes that he offers.

Sending IP: 68.232.200.1

Spam Sample:

Actual Headers:

Received: from ba1.mta.exacttarget.com (ba1.mta.exacttarget.com [68.232.200.1])
        by <xxx> (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8F61D7C01E5
        for <xxx>; Wed, 18 Apr 2012 12:xx:xx -0500 (CDT)
DKIM-Signature: <xxx>
Received: by ba1.mta.exacttarget.com (PowerMTA(TM) v3.5r16) id <xxx>
        for <xxx>; Wed, 18 Apr 2012 11:xx:xx -0600 
        (envelope-from <bounce-<xxx>@bounce.s6.exacttarget.com>)
From: "Rich Pfeiffer" <rich.pfeiffer@growthcentral.com>
To: <xxx>
Subject: Confirm Permission - Growth Central Information Newsletter
Date: Wed, 18 Apr 2012 11:xx:xx -0600
List-Unsubscribe: <mailto:leave-<xxx>@leave.s6.exacttarget.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
x-job: <xxx>
Message-ID: <xxx>
Content-Type: multipart/alternative;
        boundary="<xxx>"

Readable Email:

From: Rich Pfeiffer <rich.pfeiffer@growthcentral.com>
To: <spamtrap>
Subject: Confirm Permission – Growth Central Information Newsletter

You have received the Information Newsletter from Growth Central in the past and we are re-finalizing our email list for future Information Newsletters. The Growth Central Newsletters contain mental health and anger management information, announcements of trainings, and events.

If you don’t remember signing up or you’re pretty sure you never signed up at all and do not want to receive the newsletters you don’t need to do anything – you will be automatically unsubscribed.

To continue receiving the Growth Central Information Newsletter you MUST click link below:

http://app.streamsend.com/public/<xxx>/subscribe

I want to continue to receive the Growth Central Information Newsletter

Many thanks for your time!

Dr Rich Pfeiffer
Growth Central

http://growthcentral.com/

http://growthcentral.com
This email was sent by:Growth Central
6545 N Via Divina, Tuscon, AZ, 85750, US

http://cl.s6.exct.net/profile_center.aspx?<xxx>
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