Spam filters do a pretty good job. But we all know that sometimes good stuff ends up in the spam/bulk folder. It is a good idea to check the spam folder to find good stuff that is there by mistake. But how do you actually do that? You are confronted with a screen full of stuff that you really don’t want to see. The easiest thing to do is just not look at it. But, what are you missing?
eMail ID identifies stuff you want in the spam folder just like it identifies stuff in the inbox. This is my spam folder. I have 219 things to survey. Do I really want to look at 219 spam emails? How much time do I want to spend and will I even see anything I care about? And if it looks interesting, can I trust an email that my email hosting service says is spam? I don’t want to examine 219 messages – I need something that will highlight emails I want to find.
In this spam folder, two real emails stand out. (You may also notice that this image uses checkmarks instead of our traditional Check-lock – I am using the seeME version of eMail ID, which marks emails from my friends.) I like buying stuff from the Smithsonian and I am happy to have this email. I like getting 70% off from JC Penney.
Let’s focus on the JC Penney email. Without eMail ID I would have surely passed on this supposed special offer – and I am sure you would, too. This email is really suspicious:
Strike 1. It is in the spam folder.
Strike 2. It claims to be from a respected company.
Strike 3. It has a very strong call to action that seems too good to be true – 70% off!
With eMail ID, I was able to overcome the three strikes and get a nice deal from a company that I like.
When is spam not spam? When the email is really something you want. Now you can find emails from thousands of senders easily using eMail ID.