Average Gross Email Deliverability Rates Continue to Increase, Reaching a Rate of 92% in U.S. and 86% in Europe, in Q4 2005

• February 28, 2006

Average Gross Email Deliverability Rates Continue to Increase, Reaching a Rate of 92% in U.S. and 86% in Europe, in Q4 2005

Yahoo’s Domains in Europe See Increase in False-Positive Spam Filtering, Lyris Q4 2005 ISP Deliverability Report Card Finds

EMERYVILLE, CA — February 28, 2006 — Lyris® Technologies, subsidiary of J.L. Halsey (JLHY.ob) and leading provider of email marketing software solutions, today announced their finding of improved delivery of permission-based email messages among major U.S. and European Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and Email Service Providers (ESPs). The combined average gross deliverability rate for permission-based emails rose by 2%, from 87% (in Q3) to 89% in Q4. While European providers still lag overall, they are improving their deliverability more quickly than U.S. providers. Lyris publishes its findings today as part of its quarterly ISP Deliverability Report Card, documenting the delivery rates of over sixty-thousand requested email messages sent to accounts at major ISPs and ESPs worldwide.

“Even though email best practices range from country to country, European providers are improving deliverability more quickly, blocking 3% less email in Q4 compared to Q3, as opposed to U.S. providers which have improved gross deliverability only 1% in Q4,” states Dave Dabbah, Director of Marketing, Lyris Technologies, Inc. Additionally, it was found that users with addresses with one of the top ten U.S. providers were 21% more likely to receive their opt-in email in their inbox than those who used one of the bottom ten providers: 97.5% versus 76.4% percent (see Figure 1 below).

The only note of concern in the report was an increase in false-positive spam filtering by Yahoo domains in Europe. However, Yahoo was the sole European Union provider to see an increase in these legitimate emails being filtered as spam. This increase caused the average for all false-positive spam filtering to increase from 1.2% to 2.6% in Q4 2005. “The false-positive spam filtering by Yahoo Europe could herald the adoption of more aggressive filtering practices by other European ISPs and ESPs. On the other hand, it also might encourage more email marketers to improve senders’ content, mailing history, list hygiene, and other factors to improve deliverability to lessen the incidence of false-positive filtering,” states Dabbah.

Earthlink joined the ranks of the top ten domains by dramatically improving deliverability in Q4 by 5% to become the second-best ISP for gross and inbox deliverability. Knowlogy and Mac.com also joined the top-ten-delivering ISPs, improving deliverability by 3% and 2% respectively. False-positive filtering by CNC.net remains high, but decreased 24% over 2005. Gmail has also reduced false-positive filtering 15% from Q1 2005. Hotmail’s false-positive filtering has nearly tripled, from 5.3% in Q1 to 15.7% in Q4 (see Figures 2 and 3 below).

”However, even the most impressive delivery statistics can hide deliverability problems because there are of course many legitimate reasons why email messages can’t be sent,” Dabbah adds. “People switch jobs or change ISPs and don’t bother to update their email address with everyone. But to really know why individual recipients aren’t getting your mail, you need to look at the rejection messages too.”

From a period beginning October 1, 2005 and ending December 31, 2005, the Lyris EmailAdvisor service monitored the full delivery trajectories of 60,928 production-level, permission-based email marketing messages (non-discussion) sent from 49 different businesses and non-profit organizations to multiple accounts at 40 ISP and ESP domains in the United States and Europe.

The messages chosen represented a cross-section of legitimate publishing activities. Examples of email publications monitored by the study include a weekly event bulletin of a metropolitan wine tasting club, the official newsletter of a professional sports team, and a non-profit’s monthly digest of advances in the treatment of neurological disease. Retail publishers included a national electronics retailer, a swimwear manufacturer, and an online bookseller, among many others. In all cases, the recipient addresses to which the publications were sent had made an explicit “opt-in” request to receive the messages.

For a copy of the complete report, please visit our Knowledge Center

About Lyris Technologies

As a member of the J.L. Halsey family (OTC BB: JLHY) of email technology pioneers, Lyris Technologies joins Sparklist and EmailLabs in providing leading-edge email marketing solutions to the industry's largest and most diverse array of customers. Over 5,000 companies use Lyris’ email marketing solutions to automate the growth and management of their email lists, as well as publish email campaigns, email newsletters, and email discussion groups. Known for positive ISP relations, outstanding deliverability, and a commitment to permission-based marketing, Lyris solutions are leaders in the industry. We believe Lyris’ flagship product, Lyris ListManager, is the world's best-selling software solution for email marketing, while Lyris ListHosting offers the same powerful capabilities in the form of an on-demand web-based service.