• by Ray Schultz , May 22, 2020

A group called the Email Inbox Collective has launched a crowdsource solution for keeping marketing emails out of the spam folder.

The goal is to “teach the mail-categorizing algorithms used by leading email providers into treating marketing messages in a specific way,” states David Williams, chief data scientist for the Email Inbox Collective.

The Collective has a network of email account holders, who move marketing emails flagged as spam or promotional material into their primary mailbox.

The AI routines that evaluate incoming messages thus learn that these emails are safe and valuable, the group claims.

The collective was formed to “test a hypothesis: that we could train email providers' AI to treat certain messages in a certain way,” Williams adds.

Does the Collective’s network provide a critical mass sufficient to achieve this goal? The group claims that its beta testers more than doubled their open rates and resolved deliverability issues.

It remains to be seen whether this solution will prompt critical comment from privacy advocates and people who dislike email.

But Williams states, “we don't work with spammers. They've made legitimate marketing professionals jump through hoops to get their messages across, and our service is designed expressly to support best email-sending practices."