Why are my outreach emails going to spam and how do I fix it?
Summary
What email marketers say10Marketer opinions
Email marketer from Sendinblue shares that improving sender reputation involves authenticating your emails with SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, keeping your email lists clean, and avoiding spam trigger words.
Email marketer from Email Geeks shares to try to stop your outreach for week or two. After that period start with slow sending. Using custom tracing domains is also something that can help you
Email marketer from Constant Contact explains that asking subscribers to add your email address to their address book or whitelist you with their provider helps ensure your emails land in their inbox.
Email marketer from HubSpot explains that personalizing your email content and subject lines with subscriber data makes your messages more relevant and less likely to be flagged as spam.
Email marketer from Small Business Forums shares to use a tool to preview how your email will render across different email clients. This can help identify and fix formatting issues that might trigger spam filters.
Email marketer from Reddit answers question sharing that using a dedicated IP address gives you more control over your sender reputation, but requires careful monitoring and maintenance to avoid spam traps.
Email marketer from Neil Patel explains that warming up your IP address gradually builds your sender reputation, reducing the chances of being flagged as spam. Start with small volumes and increase over time.
Email marketer from Mailchimp explains that cleaning your email list regularly by removing inactive subscribers and those who have unsubscribed is crucial for maintaining a good sender reputation and deliverability.
Email marketer from Reddit shares that avoiding common spam trigger words in your subject lines and email body, such as 'free,' 'urgent,' and 'guarantee,' can help bypass spam filters.
Email marketer from Marketing Forums explains that A/B testing different subject lines and email content can help you identify what resonates with your audience and avoid triggering spam filters.
What the experts say7Expert opinions
Expert from Word to the Wise explains that content is only part of the issue and reputation also plays a large role. If your reputation is low (due to sending practices, list quality, or infrastructure problems), even non-spammy content can land in the spam folder.
Expert from Spamresource.com responds to monitor your domain's reputation using tools like Google Postmaster Tools. This helps identify issues like spam complaints, high bounce rates, and authentication failures.
Expert from Email Geeks responds believing that Gmail is identifying emails as spam and it likely means that emails that were similar (mostly in a close in content categorization space sense) were treated as spam by their recipients in the relatively recent past. So the mail you're sending looks very similar, contentwise, to mail that recipients treat as spam.
Expert from Word to the Wise advises to watch your sending volume. If you send too many emails too quickly, especially when warming up a new IP address, ISPs may flag your emails as spam.
Expert from Word to the Wise answers question that if the question is about authentication you should setup SPF, DKIM, and DMARC correctly. Check your records with a validator and ensure they are correctly setup.
Expert from Email Geeks explains that if the sales team aren't sending spam, then the details of what they're doing matter.
Expert from Email Geeks shares that if they’re using Outreach.io, they’re most likely sending prospecting mail to addresses that they’ve purchased or researched and a lot of filters treat that mail as spam because, well, it is. There’s not much you can really do here, unfortunately. The folks writing the filters do see them as working as intended. If you figure out where the delivery failures are happening you may be able to ask the filter providers to fix it, but, you’re going to have to convince your recipients that they want your mail.
What the documentation says5Technical articles
Documentation from RFC explains that implementing Sender Policy Framework (SPF) records in your DNS settings helps verify that you are authorized to send emails on behalf of your domain, preventing spoofing and improving deliverability.
Documentation from Google Workspace Admin Help states that following Google's bulk sender guidelines, including proper authentication and managing bounce rates, is essential for ensuring your emails reach Gmail inboxes.
Documentation from DMARC.org shares that Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance (DMARC) helps email receivers handle messages that fail authentication checks, protecting your domain from spoofing and improving deliverability.
Documentation from SparkPost says setting up feedback loops (FBLs) with major ISPs allows you to receive reports about spam complaints from users, enabling you to identify and address issues affecting your sender reputation.
Documentation from Microsoft Learn explains that using the Junk Email Reporting Program (JMRP) and Sender ID framework helps Microsoft identify and filter spam, thus improving your deliverability to Outlook users.