Total Self Service Email Marketing 
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Attachment – A file included in an email message. Attachments need to be encoded and decoded to be emailed.
ASP – Application Service Provider. A company that offers Internet access to programs that would otherwise need to be run on a customer’s own server.
Blacklist – A list of domains or IP addresses that an organization has deemed to be owned by spammers and thus should be blocked.
Bounce – An email message that fails to reach its intended recipient. A “hard” bounce is a permanent failure; a “soft” bounce is a transient error (but may indicate a permanently undeliverable address)
Boundary – A line of characters in an email message that indicates to the email client that different parts of the message should be “read” differently.
Charset – The character set header. Different charsets allow non-western alphabets to be sent via email.
Clickthroughs – Those who have clicked on a tracked link in an email message.
Content-type – A header which specifies what kind of content follows: text, HTML, multipart, etc.
Conversion – A recipient of an email message who buys.
Coregistration – The practice of giving visitors on other sites the option of signing up for your newsletter.
Decode – To process an encoded message into its original format so that it once again can be viewed. Your email client will automatically decode attachments.
DNS – Domain Name System. The way domain names are translated into TCP/IP addresses.
DNS Server – A computer used to look up domain names to find their IP addresses.
Domain Name – A name used to find resources on the Internet. Example: Lyris.com.
Double Opt-In – A list that requires members to confirm their membership before being added to the list.
Email Client – A program used to send, retrieve, and read email. Examples are Outlook or Eudora.
Encode – To process a non-text message (a file or picture) into text for the purposes of being mailed. Your email client will automatically decode attachments.
Field – A particular area of an email message that has a fixed purpose, such as the To: field.
Header – The part of the email message that describes where it’s from, where it’s going, who it’s being sent from, etc. Generally, most of the header is hidden by the email client.
IETF – Internet Engineering Task Force. The organization which defines standards for the Internet such as SMTP. Standards are expressed as RFCs, Requests for Comments.
IMAP – A protocol used to manage and download email from a mail server.
IP Address - A unique 32 bit number used to identify computers on the Internet. Example: 216.91.56.178.
ISP – Internet Service Provider (e.g., AOL or Earthlink)
Mail Server – A computer used to send and receive email. End users typically don’t run their own mail servers; they send their email to a mail server run by their ISP.
MIME – Multi-Purpose Internet Mail Extensions. An extension of the original email protocol that allows email to contain non-text messages, such as pictures or files.
Multipart – A content-type which allows email to include multiple kinds of content, such as text, HTML, and binary attachments.
POP3 – Post Office Protocol 3. The protocol used by email clients to download email from mail servers.
Port – The way a client program (such as an email client) connects to a server program (such as a mail server) on the internet. HTTP uses 80, SMTP 25, POP3 110, and IMAP 143.
RFC – Request for Comments. A document of the IETF. Some RFCs become rules for how things work on the Internet.
Segment – A subset or filter of your list. For example, all New Yorkers could be a segment of your full list.
Spam – Unsolicited commercial email (UCE). Commonly called spam, from the Monty Python skit where a restaurant serves nothing but spam.
SMTP – Simple Mail Transfer Protocol. The protocol used on the Internet to transmit email.
Top Level Domain – The most general part of a domain name, such as .com or .fr.
TCP/IP - Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol. The basic protocol used to transmit information on the Internet.
