Why is my Gmail domain reputation dropping from confirmation emails and how can I fix it?
Summary
What email marketers say11Marketer opinions
Email marketer from Klenty says to check your domain against blocklists, fix your DNS records and look at your engagement data (opens, clicks etc). High unsubscribe/spam rates are bad and it might be time to remove unengaged recipients.
Email marketer from StackExchange says that confirmation emails may land in spam due to content triggers or missing authentication. Ensuring proper SPF and DKIM records, along with providing clear unsubscribe options, can help improve deliverability. Also, consider the frequency and relevance of the confirmation emails to avoid being flagged as spam.
Email marketer from Reddit shares that domain reputation is affected by various factors, including spam complaints, bounce rates, and engagement metrics. To improve it, focus on list hygiene, sending relevant content, and ensuring proper authentication. Regularly monitoring feedback loops and addressing any issues promptly can help rebuild trust with Gmail.
Email marketer from ActiveCampaign Blog suggests monitoring your transactional email reputation separately from your marketing emails. Use dedicated IPs for transactional emails, ensure proper authentication, and track bounce rates and spam complaints to identify and address issues quickly. Keeping transactional emails focused and relevant is crucial.
Email marketer from Mailjet Blog shares that improving sender reputation involves consistently sending valuable content, maintaining a clean email list by removing inactive subscribers, authenticating emails with SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, and monitoring feedback loops to address issues promptly. Focusing on engagement and avoiding spam triggers are key to rebuilding trust with Gmail.
Email Marketer from Sender.net says to warm up your IP address, authenticate emails, maintain consistent sending volume, segment your list and monitor sending reputation using tools such as Google Postmaster Tools.
Email marketer from Reddit suggests that confirmation emails might be caught in Gmail's spam filters due to a lack of engagement or perceived low value. Ensuring clear opt-in processes, personalizing the emails, and testing different subject lines can help improve inbox placement. Also, monitor Google Postmaster Tools for insights into spam rates.
Email Marketer from Email Geeks shares that emails immediately after opt-in are sometimes going to have higher negative KPIs and says to consider volume.
Email Marketer from Email Geeks says that hidden fields and CAPTCHAs are typical methods used to filter out bogus signups.
Email marketer from Litmus says to ensure email authentication as Gmail and other providers use this to verify you are who you say you are.
Email marketer from Gmass shares a blog on improving low open rates. Suggesting that email marketers should avoid spam trigger words, segment lists and send relevant content. Plus send from a dedicated IP address.
What the experts say11Expert opinions
Expert from Word to the Wise explains you shouldn't send a huge amount of volume when starting out with a new IP and domain because you don't have a reputation and Gmail doesn't know you. If you are doing this, Gmail will throttle you or send you to spam.
Expert from Spam Resource explains that confirmation emails are often targets of list bombing, where spammers sign up many addresses to a list. If you send confirmation emails to these addresses, and some are spam traps or complain, it will hurt your sending reputation. He recommends reviewing sign up sources and IP addresses to reduce this.
Expert from Email Geeks shares that many folks use COI to avoid bad signups leading to poor reputation. By segregating it, all the bad traffic is on one subdomain.
Expert from Email Geeks recommends maintaining an audit trail of signups, including timestamps, peer IP addresses, signed-up emails, and metadata like the referer header, to identify potentially fraudulent activity.
Expert from Email Geeks shares they don't think the subdomain rep can be repaired with the traffic and it's not quite clean enough.
Expert from Email Geeks shares if transactional mail is the COI mail then it will look suspicious because there is no repeat mail on that domain.
Expert from Email Geeks shares there is no generic 'how to do this' and can only offer a "Here's why folks might be giving you fake data and here are some strategies."
Expert from Email Geeks explains that reputation isn't always directly correlated with delivery, and low open rates might indicate spam placement or Google not pre-fetching mail.
Expert from Email Geeks suggests the possibility of subscription bombing or other automated sign-up requests leading to confirmation emails being sent to users who didn't request them.
Expert from Email Geeks suggests using the ESP's COI (Confirmed Opt-In) infrastructure and tools like Zerocaptcha to help prevent fraudulent signups and improve email deliverability.
Expert from Email Geeks suggests segregating transactional mail can hurt deliverability because the good reputation isn't helping with the iffy transactional mail.
What the documentation says4Technical articles
Documentation from SparkPost explains that domain reputation is a critical factor in email deliverability. Issues arise from high bounce rates, spam complaints, and poor list hygiene. Solutions include implementing confirmed opt-in (COI), regularly cleaning the email list, and ensuring emails are properly authenticated to avoid being flagged as spam.
Documentation from RFC-Editor explains that SPF records allow you to authorize specific servers to send emails on behalf of your domain. SPF records assist in helping prevent malicious actors from sending messages on your behalf.
Documentation from Google Postmaster Tools Help explains that a low sender reputation can cause emails to be marked as spam or rejected. This is influenced by factors such as spam complaints, sending unwanted mail, and authentication practices. To fix this, ensure proper authentication (SPF, DKIM, DMARC), send wanted mail, and reduce spam rates.
Documentation from DMARC.org explains that implementing DMARC helps protect your domain from email spoofing and phishing attacks. Proper implementation involves setting up SPF and DKIM, publishing a DMARC record, and monitoring reports to identify and address any authentication issues. This can improve your domain reputation with Gmail.