What resources and skills are recommended for deliverability optimization?
Summary
What email marketers say10Marketer opinions
Email marketer from SendGrid shares that improving email deliverability involves using a dedicated IP address, warming up the IP address, authenticating your email (SPF, DKIM, DMARC), segmenting your lists, and monitoring your sender reputation using tools like Google Postmaster Tools.
Marketer from Email Geeks advises to focus on reading and hands-on learning for deliverability optimization. He recommends blogs such as Word to the Wise, Spam Resource, and Kickbox. He also recommends <https://emailresourc.es/#|https://emailresourc.es/#>
Email marketer from Stack Overflow explains the importance of understanding email bounce codes (e.g., hard bounces, soft bounces) to identify and address deliverability issues. They also explain hard bounces indicate permanent delivery failures, while soft bounces indicate temporary issues.
Email marketer from Mailchimp explains that understanding email deliverability requires considering sender reputation, authentication, content quality, and subscriber engagement. They also emphasize the importance of list hygiene and avoiding spam triggers.
Email marketer from Reddit responds suggesting that warming IPs is best done by starting with low volumes of email (e.g., 500 emails/day) and gradually increasing the volume over several weeks. Also maintain a good reputation by sending to engaged subscribers and monitoring bounce rates.
Email marketer from ReturnPath shares the best approach for list segmentation involves grouping subscribers based on demographics, behavior, and engagement levels to send more targeted and relevant emails. They also emphasize that better targeting improves engagement and reduces the likelihood of spam complaints.
Email marketer from HubSpot emphasizes that key deliverability factors include sender reputation, spam complaints, email authentication (SPF, DKIM, DMARC), list hygiene (removing inactive subscribers), and consistent sending volume. They also suggest monitoring bounce rates and unsubscribe rates.
Marketer from Email Geeks suggests that having a technical foundation, including knowledge of SMTP, email authentication, DNS, and how to read email headers, can help learn a lot about deliverability from blogs and the Email Geeks group.
Email marketer from EmailGeek Forums responds sharing that implementing email authentication protocols such as SPF, DKIM, and DMARC is crucial for improving deliverability by verifying the sender's identity and preventing spoofing. They suggest regularly checking authentication records and monitoring DMARC reports.
Email marketer from Litmus shares that a great way to improve deliverability is by A/B testing different elements of your email campaigns, such as subject lines, content, and sending times, to optimize engagement and reduce spam complaints. They recommend analyzing the results and iterating on your approach.
What the experts say3Expert opinions
Expert from Word to the Wise explains that feedback loops (FBLs) are an essential resource for deliverability optimization because they provide data on spam complaints. Setting up and monitoring FBLs allows senders to identify and remove subscribers who are marking their messages as spam, improving sender reputation.
Expert from Spam Resource emphasizes that understanding and implementing email authentication methods like SPF, DKIM, and DMARC is a crucial skill for deliverability optimization. Correct authentication helps establish sender legitimacy and reduces the risk of emails being filtered as spam.
Expert from Word to the Wise explains that understanding email metrics (bounce rates, complaint rates, engagement rates) is a critical skill for deliverability optimization. Monitoring these metrics allows senders to identify and address issues impacting their sending reputation and deliverability.
What the documentation says5Technical articles
Documentation from Google Postmaster Tools explains how to use the platform to monitor your domain reputation, spam rate, feedback loop, and authentication status. It helps identify potential issues impacting deliverability to Gmail users.
Documentation from DKIM explains that DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail) is an email authentication method that uses cryptographic signatures to verify the sender and integrity of an email message. This helps prevent email tampering and phishing attacks.
Documentation from DMARC.org defines DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance) as an email authentication protocol that builds upon SPF and DKIM to provide domain owners with control over how email receivers handle messages that fail authentication checks. It also provides reporting mechanisms to monitor email authentication performance.
Documentation from Microsoft defines that understanding the limits around senders and recipents is critical for successful deliverability. Limits include the number of recipients per message, messages per day, and the rate at which messages are sent. These limits can impact deliverability if exceeded.
Documentation from RFC Editor explains that SPF (Sender Policy Framework) is an email authentication method that helps prevent email spoofing by allowing domain owners to specify which mail servers are authorized to send email on behalf of their domain.