I have a deeply humiliating confession to make.

For weeks, I thought my entire email subscriber list absolutely detested me. My AWeber dashboard looked like a flatlined EKG machine. Zero percent open rates.

Total, unadulterated deafening silence.

After going into a mini-panic, it turns out  it wasn’t my fault . . . for once.

I was suffering from an incredibly stupid technical pitfall that is probably silently messing with your bank account while you sleep.

See, I was keeping my domain sender reputation squeaky clean. No bloated graphics. Dancing Gifs or pop ups.

Just naked conversational text to slip past the spam filters like a speed boat on a moonless night.

But because my emails had zero visible images, Gmail and iCloud’s (and others) privacy filters went into red alert and threw up their Star Wars shields.

They spotted AWeber’s single, hidden, 1×1 tracking pixel at the bottom and silently blocked it out of existence.

My subscribers (who I was calling inappropriate names by this time) were reading my words, but AWeber kept reporting a big, fat ZERO for opens.

AWeber’s deliverability was stellar. Five star rating. However, Gmail, iCloud and the other email gang of thugs, need counseling on how stand down and not got into Defcon 5.

If you are sending pure text emails through an autoresponder, your tracking data is probably a big fat misdirect bald-faced lie. You think your subscribers are ghosting you.

Not so fast . . . email providers are gaslighting the hell out of you.

The fix is stupid-simple and in direct conflict with all I put into practice about warming up your domain with a new autoresponder. As in, only send plain text emails. That’s it.

You just need extend a hand to shake Gmail and the other email providers’ digital hands to assure them you’re not invading anyone’s privacy.

This is how easy it is:

Drop a tiny headshot photo, no more than 100 by 100 pixels, into your signature block. That’s it.

Now, Gmail and the others see a legitimate business message instead of a sleazy text file hiding Aweber’s tracking device. Your email providers auto-load my headshot, forcing Aweber’s ghost tracking pixel to fire right alongside it. Success. Accurate email data. 

I didn’t believe it until I tested it. Yes, it works.

Before you panic and say nasty things about your subscribers like I did, do this: