AOL banned our site's confirmation emails

[kellyandsummer]

When someone joins our site, we send them a confirmation email. They must click a link in it to verify their wish to join. A month ago, 60% of people reported not receiving the email, either it went to spam folder or didn't come at all. Since then, we've read many tips and changed the subject and text of the email to get rid of words that may trigger spam filtering. It worked like a charm for yahoo and many others, but AOL still doesn't let it through. Not only that, but it doesn't even go to the AOL spam filter. It doesn't make it to aol AT ALL.

Any suggestions on how to appeal to AOL to find out whats up?

[keyplyr]

I read this often at various forums. Usually the best advice is to contact your host and have them attempt to get AOL to lighten up. Most likely someone else on the same server has drawn attention to the IP, causing you to be penalized along with themselves (this is, of course, if you are using shared hosting.)

[idoc]

You might also check your i.p. against the spammer databases. If you have a shared host there is a fair chance someone has already spoiled your hosts i.p. block. Next, make sure your host has a ptr entry in DNS for your domain that you send mail from. eg. mail.yourdomain.com must have a reverse lookup entry for the i.p. you send mail from or aol and rr will not take mail from you. Nor would the mail servers I keep. Also coming on the horizon, you will likely need the spf sender policy framework registered for you server or you will not be able to send. The old adage about a bad apple spoiling the whole barrel applies here. SPAM is such a rampant problem for most companies and ISP's now.

[EVOrange]

You can also contact AOL to get your emails allow through, provided you adhere to their TOS about such.
I have the url somewhere, but probably searching for it online will get you to it as well.
I had the same issue and my emails are now allowed through. When an AOL person reports me to AOL as a spammer, which they do most times without realizing it, believe it or not, I get a TOS Violation from AOL.
AOL strips the persons email from the email they send me, but as I use the persons name from my db in the email body, i am able to id them and send them a separate note to let them know that they inadvertently blocked the emails they had asked to receive. Most times that is all it takes