Bank of America Steps It Up To Stop Spammers

It is a sad reality that there are unscrupulous folks that send spam and fishing email. Some of the most authentic looking and most dangerous spam I have seen in my in box have been from fishers trying to replicate Bank of America Emails. These fake emails usually notify me that my account has been frozen and then encourages me to click on a link or to reply with personal information.

Today I received a legitimate email from Bank of America. This email introduces updates they are making to their emails. This includes a new look, personalization, a security checkpoint, alert information and more. I am sure the flood of B of A spoofed emails has been a headache for the bank. Hopefully these changes will solve the issue and stop the spammers.

Here is the email I received from Bank of America:

Here is more on the B of A alerts:

What do you think about the changes Bank of America is making? Do you think an email redesign will slow down the spammers? What else should businesses do to stop spammers? Share your thoughts!

Email Client Market Share : Report On The Top 10 Email Clients

Fingerprint recently released a report on the top 10 email clients.

Right click the image to see a larger version.

Data was collected from 250,000,000 email recipients using the Fingerprint analysis tool. This chart shows the top 10 email clients by market share. This wasc Compiled February 24th 2010.

The Top 10 are:

Email client  (Market share)
1- Outlook (43%)
Outlook 2003 and earlier ( 34%)
Outlook 2007 (9%)
2- Hotmail  (17%)
3- Yahoo! Mail  (13%)
4- Gmail (5%)
5- Apple Mail     (4%)
6- iPhone  (4%)
7- Thunderbird      (2.4%)
8- Windows Live Mail (Desktop)                (2%)
9- AOL Mail  (1.2%)
10- Lotus Notes    (0.4%)
Others (8%)

Does anything in this list surprise you?

NOTE:
Email clients are recorded when images are loaded within an email. Some email clients block external images, or are not capable of displaying HTML email. That includes non-current models of Blackberry, and other mobile devices unable to view HTML email. As a result these are not tracked and do not appear in the report.

Furthermore, the report only shows the top 10 email clients detected. In total there are over 3,000 different clients. Because of this diversity we recommend analyzing your own mailing lists to gain the most accurate information, since results can vary greatly depending on your lists' demographics.

Invitations In Email: Make It Fun and to the Point

From time to time you might want to send an invitation to your subscribers. Maybe there is a private event, a new store opening, a special sale or other event that you would love your subscribers to attend.

I recently saw a great invitation email from Shutterfly.  Shutterfly uses a template very similar to personal event email invitations (namely “e-vite”) to promote their “exclusive sale”. It gives the user a more personal, special feel, just like they are being invited to a special party by their friend. Simple, personal, and straight to the point. Nice!

The Subject Line is: Feel the love. Save 20% at our invitation-only Insider Sale.