Improve Your Email Deliverability and Keep Your Emails Out of Spam Folders

Let’s talk about emails (and deliverability). 

Speaking plainly, knowing your emails actually reach people’s inboxes is the whole point of sending the email in the first place. So when messages land in spam instead of the inbox, it’s a real problem, and usually not one team’s fault to fix. Deliverability issues touch IT, communications, fundraising, and marketing teams, which is exactly why they tend to fall through the cracks.

Here are the best practices we recommend to keep your emails out of spam and in front of the people who need to see them.

What factors impact email deliverability? 

Email deliverability is determined by both technical set-up as well as sending behavior and email content. 

Technically, you need to ensure that the system you’re using to send email is correctly authenticated with your domain. See our article How to Make Your Domain Unspoofable to learn more about email authentication protocols that your IT team can put into place.

In addition to the technical authentication done in your domain records, you also need to ensure the content of your emails and the sending patterns comply with best practices. There is a federal regulation to help limit spam email called CAN-SPAM. The requirements of that regulation apply to any commercial email, and include a requirement to offer an opt out link. 

Even if your email isn’t commercial in purpose – for example, a newsletter informing subscribers about your organization’s accomplishments – it’s a good idea to follow the CAN-SPAM guidance, as many email service providers have built their spam filters around the rules from CAN-SPAM. Even if you aren’t explicitly advertising anything, you’ll benefit from improved deliverability by following these best practices. 

The Alphabet Soup of Email Authentication: SPF, DKIM, and DMARC

To improve email deliverability, the first step is configuring three email authentication protocols for your domain: SPF, DKIM, and DMARC. 

Each of these acronyms refers to a different email authentication protocol that has to be set up for your domain. You don’t need to know what these acronyms mean – managing this for you is part of your IT provider’s scope! You can learn more in our article How to Make Your Domain Unspoofable. 

What you need to know is that if you’re sending email with a software program, we need to set up a corresponding SPF and DKIM record for that program. If you send email via Google Workspace and Mailchimp, for example, we need to make sure that there are records for each of those. 

You also need to have a DMARC record, which tells email recipients what to do with emails that don’t match your authentication records. When you onboard with Personified, we make sure that you have a DMARC record in “reporting” mode, which lets us monitor whether emails sent by your domain have the right authentication configured. 

Choosing Where to Send an Email From

While Google and Microsoft are services that were built around sending emails, these tools actually aren’t meant for bulk sends of emails. It’s important to stay within your email program’s sending limits: 

• For Google, this is 2,000 messages per day (1,500 via mail merge)
• For Microsoft, this is 10,000 messages per day, limited to 30 per minute

However, it’s important to know that even below these limits, your account can face scrutiny for sending as few as 100 identical emails. If you will be sending high volumes of email from your Google or Microsoft account, start slowly and work up to high volumes over time. 

If you’re using the BCC field to send emails to more than 100 people, this is likely to put your domain under scrutiny for failing to comply with CAN-SPAM. Try this instead: 

• Use mail merge functionality built into Gmail or Microsoft.
  • In Google Workspace, combine mail merge with the newsletter templates feature to include the information required by CAN-SPAM. 
• Use a listserv to email a large group (create a Google Group, Microsoft 365 Group, or use third party listserv software).
• Use a program dedicated to bulk mailing like EveryAction, MailChimp, Constant Contact, etc., especially once your list exceeds 100 recipients. 

Once you start using a dedicated communications platform for email lists, consider using a dedicated subdomain for bulk email sending as well. Remember, just like with a new account, you will need to slowly build up sending volume from new subdomains. 

What behavior can get emails flagged by spam algorithms?

In addition to algorithms that detect whether emails comply with CAN-SPAM, email filters also use algorithms to detect emails that look like unsolicited marketing, phishing, or scams. Most email spam filtering companies don’t disclose their secret sauce, but we do know some email sending behaviors that are more likely to get emails flagged as spam. This includes rapidly sending large amounts of email from a new domain or subdomain; having a lot of recipients mark emails from your domain as spam; or sending content that could be flagged as malicious, including short emails, emails without subject lines, emails referencing financial content, or emails with links to compromised websites. 

Following the best practices outlined above – like using a dedicated email sending software rather than relying on the BCC field – give you the best chance at a healthy domain rating. 

Monitoring Your Spam Scores

How can you tell your spam scores? This ecosystem can be challenging to navigate with each company closely guarding their own algorithms, but Google offers a tool for you to see how Gmail interprets your domain: Google Postmaster Tools. We recommend that the team responsible for sending bulk email incorporate checking Google Postmaster into their processes.  

Struggling with email deliverability or other IT issues?

Whether your emails are landing in spam, users are experiencing technical issues, or your team just needs an extra set of expert eyes, Personified is here to help. From troubleshooting email deliverability to resolving day-to-day IT challenges and strengthening your organization’s security, we’ll help identify the issue and get you moving again.

Need support? Reach out, we’d love to help your team.