How to Resolve a MailChimp’s Omnivore Warning Issue?

Email Marketing is a great way of promoting your business. And just like every other marketing strategy, its main purpose is to find potential customer and clients, by also building a stronger relationship with them. However, if not done correctly, email marketing can actually harm your business. It’s not as easy as it seems. So unless you are an expert yourself, the solution is to use a tool.  One of the possible ways to promote your product or service through an email is by using a marketing automation platform such as MailChimp. It’s a software that helps companies find their audience and build a brand, by targeting people based on their behavior and preferences. It just simplifies your work. But even this simple solution comes with certain complications.

“MailChimp’s abuse prevention system, Omnivore, has identified some issues with the addresses on Compiled Contact List for all sectors that have never been sent to through our system”.

Have you received such a message recently? If yes, then you are aware of the MailChimp’s warning issue that has been displeasing its customers for some quite time now. If not, it’s just a matter of time until you face this problem as their customer. However, it’s nothing to be worried about as there is a solution to the problem. But, first, let’s get to the bottom of this issue.

What is Omnivore and why do you get a warning ?

Omnivore is a prevention system used by MailChimp. Think of it as a filter that’s just trying to prevent your reputation from being ruined. And theirs as well. In order to do this, the system uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) that scans the mailing lists you upload on the software.  And before the platform automatically starts with the search for your potential customers and clients, Omnivore does its own research first. And that’s where the problems begin. Ever since 2008, the AI serves for targeting email addresses on your list that might trigger complaints, blacklisting, or a high bounce rate. Each email list bears a certain amount of risk level, and if the risk is higher than the allowed level, the addresses will not be delivered. Thus, you get the warning.

The warning can be triggered by a few types of emails.

• Stale email address : These are the email address users that have not received emails from your business for a longer period of time. It can happen because of many reasons including people leaving companies, or simply rejecting your emails as not relevant to them.
• Unfamiliar email addresses : It’s usually the ones that are being contacted for the first time and it can cause a problem only if you exceed the limit of allowed unfamiliar addresses.
• Spam traps : A spam trap is an email address sent by ISPs, third parties, or anti-spam organizations usually in order to catch spammers.
• Low quality emails :
• This includes emails that look wrong, those with job titles instead of names, and the ones that have already passed through MailChimp as faulty.

Omnivore is not meant to damage your business, but on the contrary to improve it. If there isn’t such a filter your emails might be received as spam, causing even a block by the Internet Service Provider (ISP) for sending too much spam. Needless to say, this will affect your business badly. However, while all of this is great, the main problem is that Omnivore does not make this any easier for you. The AI will not tell you which email addresses are viewed as a high-risk. It’s up to you to think of a solution to the problem, to find the faulty emails, and remove it. Or is it? We might help you with that.

What to do after receiving a warning ?

First of all, do not ignore the warning. You won’t be able to resume your email campaign until the issue is resolved. The solution is not to bypass this warning, but to find the best way to fix your issue. Remember, your company’s future is at stake. The obvious solution here is to thoroughly clean your email address list and re-import it. However, this requires time and patience. You will need to find the faulty emails by yourself, and that can be a rather difficult task, especially if the list is very long. An easier way to overcome the issue is by using an email verification and cleaning system such as EmailMarker. This way you’ll get a filtered list in no time, without any effort from your side. It will boost your email campaign, and save not just your time, but also your money.

How to prevent receiving a warning in the future ?

The first thing that you need to do in order to prevent this situation from happening again, is to get at least a double opt-in. And opt-in is when people agree to be contacted by you and receive emails etc. This means that as soon as someone signs up to receive emails from you (the first opt-in), a verification email is sent and the second opt-in process is done only after they confirm by clicking the verification link. It will drastically reduce spam. Moreover, you should be careful with third-party lists as they are known for using questionable tactics for data collections. If you have the time and the patience, one possible solution is to manually remove every possible threat to your business. Another solution is to use an email validation service, such as EmailMarker. It’s an easy way to clean your email for future email campaigns, making sure that you won’t get the annoying warning from Omnivore ever again.

No matter the size of your email contact list, here at EmailMarker, we can help you validate your contacts. Our email verification and cleaning services are ideal for any type of business, no matter the size. Whether you have a 500 contact list, or even up to 10 million contacts, we’ve got you covered. Keep in mind that the future of your business is at stake, meaning your feature as well. Email marketing is a vital part of your overall marketing strategy, if not one of the most important steps towards reaching long-term clients. By using a cleaning and verification service, you get precision, professionalism, and great results in no time. Make the right choice for your business.