Compliance & Deliverability

ISP Update: Microsoft Embraces Trusted Unsubscribe By Kirill Popov, Responsys Deliverability and ISP Relations October 2006

Microsoft's Windows Live, which is in beta and slated to replace Hotmail in the coming months, will include a new and exciting mechanism for email marketers: the unsubscribe button.

For email senders who are in the recipient's Safe List and employ a special unsubscribe header, Microsoft will replace the oft-used "Report Spam" button with an Unsubscribe button. Users clicking on this unsubscribe button will generate an automated unsubscribe request back to the sender, mimicking the way the current complain feedback loop operates. The biggest difference, however, is that the email sender will not receive a negative hit to their reputation in Microsoft's spam filtering system.

How This Affects Email Marketers

The unsubscribe button holds great promise for marketers on a couple of levels. ISPs are doing a great job at convincing users to never use unsubscribe links but rather click on "Report Spam" buttons to make email go away. This has the unintentional effect of depriving legitimate marketers of unsubscribe requests and hurting their deliverability reputation in the process. Introducing the unsubscribe button in the UI of the email application will help restore consumer trust in email as well as give us good guys a break.

Not everything is smooth sailing, however. Microsoft's current design adds the email sender to the user's private block list when the Unsubscribe button is pressed. While it is understandable that Microsoft wants to prevent abuse of the unsubscribe process, this blocking presents some real issues. For example, a user may wish to unsubscribe from a sender's promotional email, but end up un-knowingly blocking the sender's transactional email as well. Additionally, a user that unsubscribes from a mailing list with this mechanism will have to manually remove the sender from their block list before being able to re-subscribe.

What Responsys Recommends

Here at Responsys we are excited that Microsoft is reaching out to legitimate marketers, but at the same time we are taking a cautious approach to this new mechanism. There are definite advantages to an ISP-endorsed unsubscribe process, yet Microsoft's implementation has a few bugs left to be worked out. As the mechanism is still in beta, we are working with Microsoft and other ESPs to provide relevant feedback on how this change will affect legitimate email marketers.

We look forward to providing support for Microsoft's unsubscribe process, and will keep you updated as development of this mechanism continues.

Note: Responsys provides this information as a service to its clients; however, Responsys can not provide legal advice, and you should contact an attorney for a more complete analysis, as well as guidance about the steps you need to take in order to comply with all laws and regulations.