this issue:
Put your name on the map | Googling your competitors | Spam, Spam, Spam - stemming the flood | Netco search upgrade

 

Spam, Spam, Spam

Stemming the flood

Spam is swamping the Internet for both users and providers of e-mail and Web services.

OneSquared, Netco's provider, is no exception. All e-mail accounts we service now carry spam filtering.

You can resist it in other ways. If your e-mail account is a 'catch-all' you are probably copping an unfair volume of spam. A catch-all means your e-mail accepts anything as long as your domain name is addressed correctly. That is, bob@mycompany.co.nz is as good as deadhead@mycompany.co.nz.

Instead of a catch-all, ask us to substitute aliases. You would have an email account and up to 4 aliases, such as sales@, info@, enquiries@ etc. Your account would reject anything not specifically addressed to the main account or any of the aliases, bouncing it back to the sender.

A Netco customer recently had his e-mail address adopted by a Romanian spammer and when the spammer's list of recipients proved out-of-date, our customer received several thousand rejection messages each day in his in-box as the spam failed to find a legitimate address. Dropping the catchall on his e-mail blocked and bounced virtually all of them.

The recently passed Unsolicited Electronic Messages Act 2007 aims to stop New Zealanders sending spam but probably 99% of it originates offshore. If you send commercial e-mail newsletters you should be aware of the provisions of the new Act to ensure that all of your commercial e-mails are expected and legitimate.

Let your recipients "opt in" to your mailing list - don't subscribe them yourself. Let them "opt out" (unsubscribe themselves). Don't disguise your originating address.

We make web sites, we're not lawyers so seek legal advice if you think your e-mailing activities might brush up against the anti-spam law. Here are reference sites to learn more:

http://www.beehive.govt.nz/ViewDocument.aspx?DocumentID=27828

IT Minister, David Cunliffe's second reading speech. It sets out the aims of the law and why it's considered necessary.

www.bellgully.com/newsletters/01Media/marketing_antiSpam.asp

Help yourself to some free advice from Advice from Bell Gully, lawyers

http://www.antispam.govt.nz/

Internal Affairs' advice site on spam.

Recent research suggests the United States is the biggest producer of spam with China and South Korea a distant second and third.

Netco search upgrade

Our own site search engine has been improved with new features.

The latest addition to Netco search lets your web site visitors see their search terms highlighted throughout the web site. Say they search for "television" on Netco's site, and the first result is labelled 'How to write a press release'.

Before, if they clicked the link they'd have seen the article, but wouldn't have known where "television" appeared in the text. With search term highlighting, they can quickly scroll the page and see each term lit up, making their hits obvious.

The highlighting goes a step further: it will highlight search terms in the plural, e.g. searching for "fox" will also highlight "foxes" in the hit pages. Try it out on the Netco web site and talk to us at info@netco.co.nz for your own.

this issue:
Put your name on the map | Googling your competitors | Spam, Spam, Spam - stemming the flood | Netco search upgrade