By Melissa Elsner, Chief Technology Officer

In the ever-evolving landscape of digital marketing, email remains a cornerstone strategy for reaching and engaging customers directly. However, the effectiveness of email marketing hinges on deliverability – the ability of your emails to reach the inbox without being flagged as spam or rejected by email service providers. As CTO for 4media group, I know firsthand how important it is to implement best practices that not only maximize email deliverability but also safeguard a company’s domain reputation. Additionally, with Google and Yahoo’s recent update to DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance) requirements, compliance is more crucial than ever to ensure your emails are trusted by major email providers and delivered to your sales prospects and existing clients.

Here are some best practices for maximum deliverability and compliance in email marketing in 2024:

1. WORK WITH YOUR IT TEAM TO IMPLEMENT EMAIL AUTHENTICATION STANDARDS

Email authentication alerts recipients that your emails are legitimate and helps prevent email spoofing. This is a critical but often ignored step when first ramping up email marketing efforts. The most common authentication policies your IT team should implement are:

  • SPF (Sender Policy Framework): SPF allows you to specify which mail servers are permitted to send email on behalf of your domain. This is done by adding a specific SPF record to your domain’s DNS settings.
  • DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail): DKIM adds a digital signature to every email, allowing the recipient to verify that the email was indeed sent from your domain and has not been tampered with.
  • DMARC: DMARC builds on SPF and DKIM, allowing you to specify how receivers should handle emails that fail SPF or DKIM checks. Compliance with the updated Google and Yahoo DMARC requirements lets you request reports from email servers that get messages from your organization or domain. These reports have information to help you identify possible authentication issues and malicious activity for messages sent from your domain.

2. Clean Up Your Lists

A clean mailing list is crucial for high deliverability rates. Regularly purge your list of inactive subscribers and incorrect email addresses. Consider employing an opt-in mechanism where subscribers confirm their email addresses, ensuring that you’re only sending emails to engaged and valid recipients.

3. Reputation Matters

Your sender reputation is influenced by factors such as bounce rates, complaint rates, and engagement metrics, which all impact your emails’ deliverability. Tools like Google Postmaster can provide insights into your domain’s reputation, spam rates, and other critical metrics. Keep an eye on these indicators and take corrective action when necessary to ensure your emails continue to be received.

4. Content and Frequency Impact Results

The content of your emails and how often you send them can significantly impact deliverability. Low quality, spammy content or repetitive kitschy sales “drip campaigns” are a recipe for getting blocked. ‘Spammy’ language or aggressive sales pitches can also trigger spam filters.

Ensure your emails provide value to your recipients with engaging content that is personalized to them. These types of campaigns encourage interaction and often have better engagement rates. Also, be mindful of your sending frequency to avoid overwhelming your subscribers.

5. Comply with Regulations

Tedious legal language can be a boring read but ignoring the law can be expensive. Compliance with email marketing regulations, such as GDPR in Europe and CAN-SPAM in the U.S., is non-negotiable. Sadly, many companies continue to be ignorant of the law and out of compliance. These regulations include requirements for consent, unsubscribe options, and sender information. Ensuring compliance not only protects your company legally but also builds trust with your recipients.

6. Use a Dedicated Subdomain

If you’re sending high volumes of email, consider using a dedicated subdomain for your email marketing. This isolates your sender reputation from your main company domain and gives you more control over your deliverability. One caveat, you will want to ease into the new address by gradually increasing sending volumes which can help establish a positive sending reputation and minimize being flagged.

7. Test and Optimize for Success

Continuously test different aspects of your email campaigns, including subject lines, content, and send times to see what works best for your audience. Use A/B testing to make data-driven decisions which enable you to continuously improve your email strategy. Our 4media marketing team utilizes this testing to home in on what is relevant and engaging to our clients per campaign and how that sentiment changes throughout the year.

8. Engage with Feedback Loops and Handle Bounces

Sign up for feedback loops with major mailbox providers to receive notifications when recipients mark your email as spam. This information can help you remove these subscribers from your list and adjust your strategy to reduce complaints. Also, implement a process to handle bounced emails effectively, removing invalid addresses from your list promptly.

Setting up your email marketing for maximum deliverability requires a multi-pronged approach that focuses on authentication, list hygiene, content quality, and adherence to regulations. By following these best practices and staying compliant with DMARC requirements, you can ensure your email marketing efforts are successful while safeguarding your domain’s reputation and fostering trust with prospects and clients alike.