To answer your question of, would I send an email like this, the answer would have to be yes. I would because I believe, when it comes to emailing that is, the "shotgun approach" as oppose to the "BB Gun" approach. I say that because although it may be a bit redundant, it is still better to try an get everyone to whitelist you even though, like you have been receiving emails consistently without being filtered. I think that approach would be for someone like me who happens to check my spam box for an interesting email that I would enjoy reading that may have been filtered. If I enjoy the content or think its relevant I’ll then add them to my address book.

For those of you still following this conversation, there’s a nice example of a well-done "change of address" email on The Email Wars (another good email marketing blog).

Click the trackback link (A Well-Done “Change of Address” Email…) right above this comment to see my reaction to it and to get the link to go see the email.

Why not a subject line like this:

"Never Miss our E-Fare Deals!"

Within the email body, you could encourage whitelisting while perhaps offering a sweepstakes by filling out a survey (also a way for United to collect more coveted user data).

My point is: If you are hell-bent on sending out a whitelisitng campaign – why not make it engaging and fun?

The subject was "Are we in your address book"

Not sure if you’d consider that enticing or not. I did because of what I do, but it didn’t strike me as compelling for the average person.

I don’t think we would ever devote an ENTIRE message to whitelisting – just seems like there are so many other ways (best practices) to approach this issue.

Justin – What was the subject line for this email? Was it enticing?

That’s an interesting take on the "better late than never" idea.

To Everyone…

Let’s assume for a moment that it IS a good idea to send out a message dedicated to whitelisting. We’ll ignore for the time being the downsides that I and others have pointed out.

What would you put in that message? Would you do what United did? How would you explain/reinforce WHY someone would want to add you to the address book now (considering that s/he may have been getting your emails in the inbox all this time)? Would you try to incentivize the action somehow?

This email just doesn’t do anything for me. And I don’t think I’d send one myself. But if people are going to do it, let’s at least help them get the most out of it.

Like someone commented earlier, spam filters are becoming too efficient when they block opt-in mailings. My thinking is that the airlines, seeing this trend coming down the line, realized that sending an email NOW reminding folks to add the address to their contacts would alleviate problems should the spam filters tighten even more.

I know this has happened to me and I realized, hey, "I didn’t get my weekly newsletter from _________ and I don’t think I got it last week either." :::Digging into my spam file::: Aha! Adding it to my address list and voila… There it is! By raising awareness, people know what to do if and when a regular email ends up in the wrong folder.