Categories: WarehouseTWO Updates
By Mark Tomalonis
Principal, WarehouseTWO, LLC
WarehouseTWO recently made a significant improvement to how our system processes user-triggered emails. These emails are “Broadcast Request”, “Send Email to Seller” and “Forward via Email”. The improvement is that we no longer “spoof” users’ email addresses. Here is what “spoofing” is, and why you should care about this change to our system...
“Spoofing”: "the creation of email messages with a forged sender address". (Learn more here.) When we launched WarehouseTWO, we created functionality that allowed a user to send an email to other WarehouseTWO members, through our website. The email was addressed from the user, but was sent from our email server. This is how we ensured that the email was sent to the correct audience. Back in 2005, this was cool stuff. Very clever. We congratulated ourselves. Had a party. But in 2017, sending an email with mismatched sender’s email address and email server domain names is no longer a desired practice. (Let’s blame those nefarious malcreants from Klopstokia for ruining the internet for the rest of us.) Thus, we have recently changed our website's email functionality.
Now, all user-triggered emails sent from within the WarehouseTWO website are sent from the email address customerservice@warehousetwo.com. Thus, the domain name of the sender’s email address ("warehousetwo.com") now matches the domain name assigned to the IP address of the WarehouseTWO email server (also "warehousetwo.com"). These two domain names match. No more “spoofing”! No more emails getting snagged in our members’ email spam filters. No more user-triggered emails getting blocked because of anti-spoofing settings associated with members’ domains.
To make everything work as intended, now there is a new line in the email’s header section, “Reply To”. There is also a small-font instruction at the top of the body of the email. The sender’s email address is shown in both places.
Here is how this change affects your experience using WarehouseTWO.
The emails that you send from the WarehouseTWO website are more likely to get past recipients' spam filters, increasing the likelihood of getting a response to your email inquiries.
Now, only we at WarehouseTWO get these emails. ALL of them. Wow. Is everyone always on vacation these days? We want one of THOSE jobs.
Now, only we at WarehouseTWO get these emails. You do not. We follow-up on every one of them, so that they do not recur. Over the past few weeks, we have been cleaning up our members’ contact records. The result is that more of your BROADCAST REQUEST emails are getting through to more WarehouseTWO members.
Now, only we at WarehouseTWO get these emails. Yes, we suffer through getting one of these every hour, sometimes for thirty hours. Just so you don’t have to. :-)
In your email client, click “Reply”. Yes, it is that easy. Your email client should create a new email, addressed to the WarehouseTWO user’s email address, not to customerservice@warehousetwo.com. You should verify that the intended recipient’s email address is in your response email’s “To” field, at least the first few times that you respond to a WarehouseTWO user’s inquiry email.
Let us know what you think of this improved functionality. Contact us.
About the Author
After a successful career in sales and operations management in the wholesale-distribution industry, Mark Tomalonis is now principal of WarehouseTWO, LLC. He amuses himself by writing articles, such as this one, to help wholesaler-distributors execute their operations better. Mark’s articles and tips are published in WarehouseTWO’s monthly e-newsletters. Click here to subscribe.
About WarehouseTWO
WarehouseTWO, LLC is an independent “inventory-sharing” service created exclusively for durable goods manufacturers and their authorized distributors, and for any group of durable goods “peer” wholesaler-distributors, such as members of a buying/marketing group or cooperative. To learn how inventory-sharing with WarehouseTWO can help your business, visit the WarehouseTWO website, or email info@warehousetwo.com.