September 22, 2002
Article

MarketingSherpa's List of Words That Will Get You Filtered

SUMMARY: This list of words is not for the easily offended, however, if you use these words in your email newsletter, especially in the subject line, you are highly likely to be filtered.
Just because your email does not bounce, does not mean it is actually being received by the intended recipient.

We have found ourselves filtered for some of the darnedest words (most recently the word "slimmer"). We are maintaining this list to keep ourselves and our readers abreast (whoops that is probably one!) of the changing and, to some degree, calcifying landscape. Filtering affects all marketers and publishers. Make sure your kids are not in your office, then review this list of words to make sure you are not using any:

==> Subtle ones:
'company merger'
'financial success'
‘free’
'look great'
‘merchant account’
'million emails'
'million messages'
'money-back guarantee'
'new and improved'
‘slimmer’
‘spam’ (because it often appears in “This is not spam”)
‘staggering response rates'
'they will spend more'
‘thinner’
‘this is not spam’
‘you are receiving this because’


==> Obvious ones:
‘accept major credit cards’
‘asset preservation'
‘beastie'
‘consolidating your bills’
‘credit card debt’
‘credit card processing systems’
‘earn an income’
‘everyone approved’
‘find out anything about any’
‘free cruise’
‘hardcore porn’
‘hardcore teen’
‘high quality business cards'
‘important memo:’
‘International Executive Guild Registry’
‘learn to survive a violent encounter’
‘lesbian’
‘long distance conferencing’
‘long distance rates'
‘lose weight’
‘millions of email’
‘millions of messages’
‘money judgements’
‘natural aphrodisiac’
‘order viagra online’
‘penis’
‘stop smoking'
‘this message is sent in compliance with'
‘thousands of email’
‘thousands of messages’
‘you may have won’
'accept credit cards'
'ADV:' (although this is required in some states)
'are you in debt'
'barely legal'
'be free'
'Below is the result of your feedback form’
'between my legs'
'boost your windows reliability'
'breasts'
'consolidate bills'
'debt free'
'debt-free'
'double your money'
'dvd library'
'eliminate debt now’
'eliminate IRS tax problems'
'energy levels'
'energy-levels'
'enlargement'
'enter to win’
'extra cash'
'free'
'free cash grants'
'free party line'
'free vacation'
'gay sex'
'get a bigger hammer'
'get cash'
'girlfriend will love you'
'got debt?’
'handpicked referrals'
'Henri Tobo Kabongo’
'horny'
'income opportunity’
'kids will love you'
'life insurance'
'lock your rate'
'long distance'
'losing your job'
'money making'
'money-making'
'news from day'
'out of debt'
'pay your bills'
'penis'
'penny stock'
'phone rates'
'porn access'
'protect yourself’
'rates are low'
'rates have fallen'
'real psychologists'
'real psycologists'
'refinancing your home'
'refinancing your house'
'saw your site'
'slut'
'sluts'
'start accepting credit cards'
'stock market news'
'stock pick'
'stop smoking'
'toner'
'unlimited calls'
'unsecured credit card'
'unsecured mastercard'
'unsecured visa'
'viagara'
'viagra'
'wife will love you'
'windows reliability'
'woman will love you'
'women will love you'
'work at home'
'XXX'
'you have won'
'your ebook as per your posting'
'your own business'
'your own merchant account'

==> Corrolary for Yahoo! Changing Words

In July of 2002, iMakeNews announced that Yahoo was changing words as HTML-messages were being delivered. Yahoo came clean and admitted that they had been changing words such as "eval" to "review" and "mocha" to "espresso." They were doing this to prevent pernicious code running on end-users' computers when HTML email was viewed. Since words like "medieval" were becoming "medireview," this was a particularly hamfisted way to handle disabling these potentially dangerous terms.

They have since changed their ways, and these words are now preceded with an underscore. The words you can expect to see preceded by an underscore are:

* eval
* mocha
* expression
* javascript
* jscript
* vbscript
* livescript

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