What tools can I use to monitor deliverability when sending emails from Microsoft Office or Google Workspace?
Summary
What email marketers say10Marketer opinions
Email marketer from Email Geeks warns against sending marketing emails from GHL using Google Workspace or Microsoft, as it may lead to account shutdown. Suggests using an SMTP mail server like Mailgun or Sendgrid for marketing emails out of GHL.
Email marketer from Litmus Blog suggests using email testing tools to preview how emails render in different email clients and devices, which can indirectly impact deliverability. It ensures that emails are properly formatted and avoid triggering spam filters.
Email marketer from GMass Blog advocates using a separate domain for email marketing to protect your primary domain's reputation. This isolates any deliverability issues to the marketing domain, minimizing risks to your core business email.
Email marketer from Webmaster Forum suggests using tools like MXToolbox to check your domain's DNS records (SPF, DKIM, DMARC). Proper DNS configuration is essential for email authentication and deliverability.
Email marketer from SendPulse Blog suggests setting up feedback loops (FBLs) with major ISPs to receive reports about spam complaints from their users. This helps identify and address deliverability issues proactively.
Email marketer from Neil Patel's Blog recommends using Google Postmaster Tools, especially if sending a high volume of emails to Gmail accounts. Explains Google Postmaster Tools can help you identify deliverability issues.
Email marketer from SparkPost Blog recommends using blocklist monitoring tools to check if your sending IP addresses or domains are listed on any DNS blocklists (DNSBLs). Being on a blocklist can severely impact deliverability.
Email marketer from Mailjet Blog shares that using a dedicated IP address, especially for high-volume senders, provides more control over your sender reputation. It allows you to isolate your sending reputation from other senders who share the same IP.
Email marketer from Reddit shares that GlockApps is a tool that tests email placement across multiple ISPs and blocklists. It provides detailed reports to help identify deliverability problems and optimize campaigns.
Email marketer from EmailToolTester recommends Mail-Tester.com as a free tool to check the spam score of your emails before sending them. It analyzes various aspects of your email and provides a detailed report on potential deliverability issues.
What the experts say3Expert opinions
Expert from Spam Resource (in a 2006 article, but the principles remain relevant) explains that monitoring your sender reputation is crucial. While the article doesn't directly list tools, it suggests consistently checking your IP and domain reputation across various blocklists and reputation services to understand how ISPs view your mail stream. It emphasizes proactive reputation management.
Expert from Email Geeks shares Microsoft has SNDS, Google has GPT, and Yahoo has SenderHub for deliverability monitoring. Notes he's unsure of ESPs that send mail from GWS or o365, except for cold email platforms.
Expert from Word to the Wise, in a 2019 post, emphasizes that inbox placement is a key metric to track. While not explicitly a tool, she highlights that consistently analyzing inbox placement rates across different mailbox providers provides a direct measure of deliverability performance, thereby helping to identify potential issues in your email campaigns. To know where your mail lands, you will need to utilize seed lists for each mailbox provider you are sending to and then review the results.
What the documentation says4Technical articles
Documentation from Yahoo explains that Yahoo Sender Hub provides insights into your email traffic and helps you monitor your sender reputation with Yahoo users. It includes metrics like spam complaints, authentication status, and delivery rates to Yahoo inboxes.
Documentation from Microsoft explains that the Smart Network Data Services (SNDS) program allows you to monitor the health and reputation of your sending IPs when sending to Outlook.com, Hotmail, and MSN domains. It provides data on complaint rates and spam trap hits.
Documentation from DMARC.org explains that Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance (DMARC) is an email authentication protocol that helps prevent email spoofing and phishing attacks. Implementing DMARC can improve deliverability by authenticating your emails and providing reporting on potential abuse.
Documentation from Google explains that Google Postmaster Tools provides dashboards to monitor sender reputation, spam rate, feedback loop, authentication, and encryption. The tool helps diagnose and fix email delivery problems when sending to Gmail users.