How To Stop the Spambots from Harvesting Your Email Address!

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Article Title: "How To Stop the Spambots from Harvesting Your Email Address!"
Author's Name: VectorCentral.com
Contact the Author: http://www.vectorcentral.com/contact-editor.html
Word Count: 634 words, plus bylines
Formatted at 60 cpl

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How To Stop the Spambots from Harvesting Your Email Address!
By VectorCentral.com
Copyright ©Vector Central Marketing

It is an outrage how many methods have to be implemented in
order to avoid the obnoxious and illogical practices of
spammers! But they have become a constant in online business
and we have to do our best to avoid them and continue the
battle against them!

Have you asked these questions: "Why do unwanted emails keep
coming? How do these intruders get my email addresses?" The
Answer: They "take" them!

One way in which email addresses are harvested is through
the method of software programs that send out robots and
literally grab email addresses from websites. Anywhere that
you have posted your email addresses (without methods given
below), those addresses are open for the taking by these
email-address-collecting robots.

Can you unsubscribe from these unrequested lists? As you
have probably experienced, with some lists you can forget
about being unsubscribed no matter how many times you try!
Plus, unsubscribing can show them that you are a live
recipient and your spam mail can increase from the very
action of trying to unsubscribe.

Some of these intruders give statements like: "...as long as
a way is given to unsubscribe, this can not be considered
spam." However, those of us who are against unwanted mail,
and if we did 'not' opt-in to a subscription list, believe this:
"If I did not subscribe to a list, then it is spam and an
unwanted invasion!"

There are several methods that we have researched and we
feel they will greatly assist you in knowing how to avoid
your email address from being harvested from your website.

>>METHOD #1 - Mailto Tags:
Don't use "mailto:" in your HTML pages or on your viewable
pages, which means do 'not' make your address linkable.
Most spambots are searching for "mailto:" tags to harvest
email addresses off of websites.

Solution: change the font and the font size for the "@" symbol.
This will alter the html coding and ensure that your email
address will not be harvested.

Remember: Do 'not' make your email address clickable on
HTML website pages.

>>METHOD #2 - Text Method:
You can instruct your website visitor how to copy and paste,
then change - then remove spaces...
-----
vectorcentral [at] vectorcentral.com
Be Sure to Replace [at] with: @
Remove Spaces
-----
Drawback: Too difficult for the website visitor, subscriber,
or customer.

>>METHOD #3 - Submission Forms:
Provide convenient forms on your web site and remove
all email links. Link to pages where your contact forms
can easily be found. To prevent seeming impersonal to
your visitors and customers, explain why you do not
give your email address and inform them that when you
reply to their comments, then they will have your
address for future reference. For example: "In order to
avoid email-collecting robots, we have provided this
contact form instead of email links. When we reply to
your feedback, you will then have our email address for
future correspondence..."
A Great (and free) submission form service is JotForm:
http://www.jotform.com/

IMPORTANT About Submission Forms:
If you are using the following "revisit" meta tag in
the headers of your pages to help the search engines
find your website pages, be sure to 'remove' this from
any pages that have submission forms. Otherwise, your
spam will excessively increase because the spamming
robots also look for this:
<meta name="revisit" content="15 days">

>>METHOD #4 - PRECAUTIONS:
Never give your email address to an online directory
that will post it online. It can be harvested from
there and from any website where you enter your email
address to be publicized.

In Link Exchanges, inform the other website owner to
"not" post your email address. Or if they do, give them
one of the methods above, like Method #2.

Always Protect Your Email Address and Your Website!

May your day be blessed!
Vector Central Marketing
http://www.vectorcentral.com
Contact:
http://www.vectorcentral.com/contact-editor.html

Copyright ©Vector Central Marketing

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About the Author:
Vector Central and the "Interactive Marketing Ezine" provide essential marketing methods to generate your online success. Free weekly ad with subscription: http://www.vectorcentral.com/subscribe.html
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