IN THIS ARTICLE
When creating an email, you have to think about its content carefully, as to take into account how it will be perceived by anti-spam filters. Sending questionable messages might take a negative turn on your deliverability, which is a key subject in cold email matters. Whenever you’re not sure about the words used in the email, you can use our spam checker to help you figure out if any of them are considered unsafe.
How it works
To use this feature, you need to have your email account active and connected to a campaign. The Spam checker will scan the subject line and email content, so you will need those filled in as well.
When using snippets in the email, you have to add at least one prospect to a campaign. Only then can the test be performed.
You have the possibility to check every email in your campaign, whether it’s a simple one, or you have conditions set up there. You can also scan every version of an email in your A/B tests.
When you have a final email message, click on the Spam check this email link, and wait for Woodpecker to give you the result. This takes up to one minute to finish, but sometimes our App will need more time to check everything thoroughly.
If that is the case, you will be notified about it under the notification bell, as seen in the picture below.
The result of this scan is a pop-up window with the appropriate message depending on the signal received from the spam check.
After the test is done, you will see information about it under your campaign’s general statistics. The "Spam checked" information will be visible next to every email that has been tested.
You can click on the arrow next to the individual Step and under Delivery time, see results by clicking on the “Show details” link.
It’s worth noting that even after you edit the campaign content, information about the spam test performed will not disappear.
List of messages
Your message was marked as SPAM by a content filter or was listed in one of the anti-SPAM systems
This means that your message contains words that major content filters and systems marked as spammy. They can be listed on the lists from Pyzor, Ryzor2, or Microsoft.
The solution to that would be to change your message completely and especially get rid of any words that seem suspicious. To see which words you should remove, check it with this spam analyzer »
Your message includes spam words and fraud phrases
Similar to the previous one, these words and phrases might be connected to the “salesy” language, so any that can be described as manipulative, cheap, needy, or sleazy. Once again, run a quick test in the spam analyzer and change your message.
Learn more from our blog article about words that can trigger SPAM filters »
Looks like your message includes a phishing link
Links in your message may redirect to a suspicious site. If you know of its safety, make sure the link is correctly addressed and hasn’t been shortened.
Something went wrong
No need to worry, as it might be connected to some temporary issues on our side. Give Woodpecker some time and run the test again later.
Your subject message includes currencies.
This message concerns the use of any money symbols, such as $, €, or £. Review your email content and see if you find a neutral replacement for those.
Emails sent from the free domains (like gmail.com) are more likely to get into SPAM.
We usually don’t recommend using free domain accounts, as it is not best for cold outreach. Try setting up an account on a separate domain, for example, G Suite, GoDaddy, or Outlook.
Your domain is quite fresh. Maybe you’d like to warm it up first?
Sending emails from a fresh domain may cause deliverability issues and is not recommended by us. Use our Warm-up & Recovery mode to properly warm up your email or domain.
There’s a chance your email was listed on one of the anti-SPAM lists or servers due to abusive behaviour.
If you get such a message, you should focus on checking what spam lists are involved. You can check this with tools like Mail-tester or MXToolbox. Note that different blacklists have different reputations: there are some that, despite listing your address, will not affect your deliverability as most providers do not take such a blacklist seriously.
Using phrases like “% of some amount of money” may increase the risk of getting into SPAM.
As the message says, writing about your offer in such a way is highly risky, because not only you may end up in spam, but also get blocked by your provider. Try to stay away from using such phrases, especially in the first emails to your prospects.
FAQ
Q.: Will this feature stop my campaign from sending?
The Spam checker won’t be an obstacle to running your campaign. It will, however, tell you if the content is questionable, so you can avoid any deliverability issues later.
Q.: Will the spammy words be highlighted in my email?
Yes, thanks to our Spamword Finder feature. All you have to do is switch it on with the "Spam words" icon on the editing bar below, and the words will be highlighted in orange.
Q.: Will every snippet in the prospects list be checked, due to the different message? For example, a list of 100 prospects with individual words in snippets?
When scanning snippets, only the first one from the list will be taken into consideration.