Email offers a fast and affordable communication option for businesses, but its convenience also makes it the tool of choice for marketing spammers. To be able to effectively deal with those incoming messages which are important, companies need to stay on top of junk mail and swiftly cut out emails of little or no value. And there are a number of software tools that can help in that department.
Whether you’re looking for a Postini replacement, since Google terminated the service, or you want to put an anti-junk filter in place for the first time, it’s worth investing a substantial amount of time in researching the right solution for your business. Not all email management solutions are the same and you need to find one that fits well with your existing workflow and applications.
Migration and Setup
If you are moving over from an alternative email system, such as Postini, then look for a solution that puts an emphasis on simple migration. Companies such as Mimecast have dedicated migration services that take care of all of the hard work for you — a straightforward switchover can save you a substantial amount of downtime and stress.
If you’re setting up a new anti-spam system from scratch, then look for a solution that makes the initial configuration as streamlined as possible. You don’t want to be wading through rules and setup options for several days before you can get back to your incoming email messages. An email management service that starts off on the right foot is likely to be reliable going forward.
Email Filtering
The key to any junk email filtering system lies in the quality of the filters — too strict, and genuine messages get caught in the net; too relaxed, and you’ll see spam messages leaking into your inbox, negating the benefits of having a filter in place at all. To perform to its full capabilities, your business needs a filtering system that you can rely on.
Your chosen solution should also require a minimum amount of management and hand-holding. While some manual filter tweaking can be useful, your staff don’t want to be tied up teaching the installed anti-spam tools how to recognise junk. Most of the detection should be done automatically, removing the unwanted messages before they even hit your company’s inboxes.
Advanced Features
Find the right anti-spam solution and you can expect protection that goes far beyond the basic filtering built into the likes of Outlook and Gmail. Cloud-based filtering systems allow for fast-tracked responses to new types of junk mail, with no update required on the local systems. Content inspection, IP checks and reputation analysis can all be deployed to keep unwanted messages out of your systems.
Junk email is not a problem that you just have to accept and live with — by ridding your inbox of unsolicited mail, you can improve productivity and start using email as it was intended to be used. And the key to achieving this is finding the right email management solution to keep your inbox protected.
