Does Your Email Domain Pass the Health Check? - Mystrika

Wondering if your email program is at risk of poor inbox placement, spam filtering, or outright rejection? Performing routine “check-ups” on your domain’s health is the only way to diagnose issues before they develop into chronic deliverability headaches.
In this comprehensive guide, we’ll coach you through inspecting all the critical vital signs for email sender reputation, uncovering opportunities for improving security, compliance, and engagement. With the proper monitoring and preventative care, your domain will stay off blacklists and out of spam traps for good!

Page Contents

Why Email Health Checking is Critical for Deliverability

Sending emails is easy, but making sure those emails reliably end up in recipients’ inboxes is a whole different ballgame. With inboxes flooded with hundreds of emails per day, ISPs and email providers have become vigilant about detecting spam and protecting users. Even the slightest email domain reputation issue can lead to poor deliverability or messages sent straight to the dreaded spam folder.
That’s why regularly checking the health of your email domain is critical for maximizing deliverability. By identifying and resolving any weaknesses, you can avoid common pitfalls that impair email reception. Let’s look at some key reasons health checks are vital for reaching inboxes.

Avoid Blacklists and Blocks

One of the biggest deliverability killers is having your domain or IP address added to blacklists and blocklists. These are databases that ISPs and mailbox providers use to detect spammers and keep them out of inboxes.

Once you’re on a blacklist, your emails will start bouncing or filtering to spam for all recipients using providers that reference that list. Major lists like Spamhaus or Barracuda Reputation can cripple your emailing overnight.

Some common ways legitimate senders end up unfairly blacklisted:

Your IP addresses were previously used to send spam by a prior owner.
Your server’s IP addresses are part of a cloud hosting range where other users triggered blocks.
Your emails were falsely flagged as spam due to factors like missing authentication records.

Regularly checking major blacklists lets you detect if you’ve been blocked and take prompt action. The sooner you can get delisted, the less deliverability damage is done. Being proactive beats learning of issues through recipient complaints.

Explore Blacklist Checking Tools

Maintaining blacklist health is easy with monitoring tools like MXToolbox](https://mxtoolbox.com/blacklists.aspx) and [BlacklistAlert that let you quickly scan domains and IPs against over a dozen lists. For optimum protection, perform checks weekly or anytime you modify DNS records.

Ensure Proper DNS Configuration

Your domain’s DNS setup lays the foundation for email routing and delivery. Errors or oversights in DNS can wreak havoc on your deliverability.

Key aspects like your MX records, SPF records, and reverse DNS need to be correctly configured for seamless email transmission. If recipients’ mail servers can’t utilize your DNS, messages will fail with errors like “host not found” and “relay access denied.”

Health checks assess critical records like:

A/AAAA records – Map your domain and IP addresses so servers can locate your mail infrastructure.
MX records – Designate the mail servers for accepting messages addressed to your domain.
SPF records – Authorize the IP addresses permitted to send mail from your domain, protecting against spoofing.
DKIM records – Validate senders by including your domain’s public key to encrypt signatures on messages.
DMARC records – Set policies on how unauthenticated email from your domain should be handled.
Reverse DNS – Confirms the domain ownership of mail server IP addresses.

Keeping DNS synchronized ensures senders can validate and route to your domain seamlessly. Checkers probe for missing or malformed records that could impede deliverability.

Maintain Server Uptime and Performance

Your mail servers are the engines that process and deliver your outgoing emails. Any degradation in their availability or responsiveness can directly impact your recipients’ experiences.

Ideally, your mail servers should have:

99.9% or higher uptime – Brief downtime interrupts email flow and damages deliverability if chronic.
Low latency – Recipients’ servers expect fast SMTP banner greetings and data transfers. High latency frustrates the handshake.
High throughput – Volume spikes in traffic should be handled without slowdowns or timeouts.
Up-to-date software – Outdated mail software lacks modern security and performance enhancements.

Health checks probe your mail servers directly via SMTP connections to confirm they’re online, responding fast enough, and rejecting unsecured connections. Metrics expose weaknesses impacting reliability.

Slow mail servers contribute to backscatter, timeouts, deferrals, and blocking of messages as spam. Maintaining healthy server operations is required to keep email flowing smoothly.

Authenticate Your Emails

Another critical way to build domain reputation is properly implementing email authentication protocols like SPF, DKIM, and DMARC.

These technologies provide senders a mechanism to confirm their legitimacy, proving to receivers that their emails are genuinely from their domains and not spoofed. Authentication records are published in your DNS.

When your outgoing messages lack valid authentication, receivers view them as untrustworthy. Lax policies lead to messages being marked as spam or rejected entirely.

Health checks examine your authentication records for proper configuration and completeness. Key aspects evaluated include:

SPF records

Include all authorized outbound mail servers
Enforce “-all” fail policy
Avoid syntax errors

DKIM records

Use 2048-bit RSA keys
Ensure valid signatures
Publish for each sending domain

DMARC records

Align with SPF/DKIM
Enforce policy higher than “monitor” mode
Receive aggregate and failure reports

Proper authentication signals to receivers your domain is safe, legitimate, and compliant with best practices. This bolsters deliverability and avoids spam flags.

Monitor Reputation and Compliance

Given all the potential email pitfalls, it’s essential to monitor your domain’s health and standing on an ongoing basis. As mail providers enhance their spam filters, what was once acceptable can suddenly trigger deliverability issues.

Tools like SenderScore track your domain’s global reputation based on factors like spam complaints, authentication, and blacklist history. Monitoring your trends identifies growing problems early when easier to correct.

Compliance services like Validity’s MailboxVision give more granular visibility into your domain’s health and compliance with major ISP standards. Tracking adoption of protocols like TLS encryption ensures you align with receiver best practices.

Sometimes high-volume emailers intentionally block non-compliant senders to force authentication and security upgrades. Visibility into compliance gaps enables you to proactively self-remediate issues before encountering blocks.

Regular reputation checks also provide benchmarks to compare your domain against industry averages. You can gauge the effectiveness of initiatives to improve your standing.

Make Email Health Monitoring a Habit

Maintaining email deliverability requires constant vigilance. As fast as new security protections arise, spammers develop creative workarounds. Receivers continually move the compliance goalposts.

That’s why regularly checking your domain health and staying ahead of vulnerabilities is so important. Ongoing monitoring provides assurance your email program operates optimally while identifying needs for remediation.

Implementing a routine schedule for health checks keeps your domain off blacklist and out of spam folders. Don’t let small gaps undermine your deliverability. With a robust email health plan, you can confidently reach inboxes and achieve sender success.

Key Metrics to Check in an Email Health Test

Comprehensively assessing your email domain’s health requires examining many components that influence deliverability. While checking one or two factors provides limited visibility, a multi-metric approach gives a complete view of potential vulnerabilities.
Let’s explore the core metrics every email health check should analyze for a reliable diagnosis of domain reputation and performance.

MX Records

MX records are the starting point for routing emails to your domain. They designate which mail servers are responsible for accepting messages addressed to your domain.

Checking your MX records validates they are properly configured with:

At least two reliable mail servers listed for redundancy.
Low priority numbers assigning order of use.
Valid hostnames resolving to correct IP addresses.
Proper syntax and formatting per DNS standards.

Misconfigured MX records lead to bounced messages when receiving servers try unsuccessfully to deliver. Spammers also exploit poorly configured MX records for their domains.

You can validate MX records using tools like MXToolbox](https://mxtoolbox.com/SuperTool.aspx) and [MailTester. The check confirms your mail servers are ready to receive messages for your domain.

SMTP Server Responses

Your mail servers act as the gatekeepers for incoming and outgoing email. Analyzing your SMTP servers’ health is crucial.

When performing an SMTP test, check that your mail servers:

Accept SMTP connections on ports 25, 465, and 587 from remote hosts.
Respond to connections quickly – latency under 500 ms preferred.
Use a fully qualified hostname in the SMTP banner response.
Support secure connections using TLS encryption.
Require authentication before accepting messages.
Have reverse DNS records matching their IP addresses.

Slow, unresponsive, or unsecured SMTP servers signal to spam filters that your domain lacks proper email infrastructure. Tools like Mail-Tester validate your SMTP servers’ configurations match best practices.

Connection Security and Encryption

Email encryption is no longer optional – it’s required by major receivers like Gmail, Yahoo, and Outlook. Using aged, insecure protocols undermines trust in your domain.

When reviewing security, ensure your email servers:

Support TLS v1.2 or higher for encrypting SMTP connections. Old SSL versions are no longer considered secure.
Offer both TLS and SSL for compatibility with different clients.
Prioritize TLS over SSL in server banners.
Use strong 2048+ bit RSA certificates from trusted Certificate Authorities.
Score A or A+ on SSL Labs tests which assess vulnerabilities.

Deprecating old TLS/SSL protocols leaves gaping security holes. Tools like ImmuniWeb analyze your implementation’s robustness.

DNS Configuration

In addition to MX records, proper configuration of other DNS records related to email delivery is vital. Key aspects to validate include:

A/AAAA Records – Map domain names to correct IP addresses so servers can locate your mail infrastructure.
PTR Records – Reverse DNS for mail server IPs should match A record hostnames. Confirms ownership.
SPF Records – Publish authorized outbound servers to enable spoofing protection.
DKIM Records – Include valid public keys so DKIM signatures embed on outbound messages.
DMARC Records – Align with SPF/DKIM and enforce a reject or quarantine policy.

Misconfigurations like incorrect hostnames, syntax errors, or missing records will hinder authentication and validation of your emails.

Tools like MXToolbox perform hundreds of DNS tests to expose flaws impacting email delivery and security.

Website Availability

Your website presence has reputational overlap with your email domain. Spammers rarely operate reliable websites.

When evaluating website health:

Check site load speeds are fast – under 2 secs optimal.
Verify the site uses modern TLS 1.2+ encryption.
Compare against email servers for IP/domain mismatches.
Confirm ownership with WHOIS details.
Ensure valid contact details are published.
Monitor uptime over days/weeks for reliability.

Poor web performance, outdated security, and anonymity expose your domain as potentially risky. Use website health tools like WebManage to showcase legitimacy.

Blacklist Status

As mentioned earlier, ending up on blacklists can catastrophically damage email deliverability. Monitoring major lists is imperative.

When checking blacklists, ensure:

Your primary sending IP addresses are not blacklisted.
New IP addresses procured lack historical spam baggage.
Other IP ranges you operate within are clear.
Your web server IPs and domain are not listed either.

Compare against lists like Spamhaus, Barracuda Reputation Block List, SORBS, and others. Use tools like MXToolbox](https://mxtoolbox.com/blacklists.aspx) and [MultiRBL to investigate listings.

Act swiftly to delist any blocked assets before impacted too broadly. Being proactive with blacklist checks prevents surprises.

SPF Records

SPF records help prevent spoofing by enabling receivers to validate your outbound emails. Configuring SPF properly is required for optimal deliverability.

When examining your SPF records, verify:

You have a current v=spf1 record published.
All sources of outbound email are designated as authorized senders.
The check includes include: directives for other valid domains.
A “fail” mechanism is specified to handle unaligned senders.
Syntax follows standards without formatting errors.

SPF protects your brand by blocking forged senders. Use tools like SPF Surveyor to confirm your records are complete and working for you.

DKIM Records

To complement SPF, DKIM digitally signs your outbound messages so receivers can authenticate them. Complete, valid DKIM configuration is required for passing authentication checks.

When auditing your DKIM records, check that:

A TXT record is published for each sending domain.
You are using 2048-bit RSA keys for sufficient encryption strength.
The granularity matches that of your SPF alignment.
Valid syntax is used per the RFC spec.
Signatures successfully validate in testing tools.

Proper DKIM prevents your legitimate mail from being marked as spam or rejected. Audit your records using DKIMValidator to close any gaps.

DMARC Records

DMARC builds on SPF and DKIM by codifying what receivers should do if emails fail authentication checks. A Strict DMARC policy protects your domain.

When configuring your DMARC records, ensure:

A TXT record starting with v=DMARC1 is present.
The policy is set to “reject” rather than “quarantine.”
Domain alignment matches SPF and DKIM.
Aggregate and forensic failure reports are enabled.
Syntax follows the DMARC specification precisely.

Gradually tightening your DMARC policy will ensure unauthenticated mail purporting to be from you is blocked. Use tools like DMARC Analyzer to confirm your record is complete.

Email Authentication Protocols

Finally, check that your domain has implemented the trifecta of SPF, DKIM, and DMARC to validate your emails. While individally helpful, their true power emerges when combined.

Follow these best practices:

Adopt all three protocols for maximum authentication.
Align SPF and DKIM granularity for operations.
Set DMARC policy to match SPF/DKIM rejections.
Ensure DKIM signatures pass validation checks.
Monitor failed messages and compliance visibility.

Fully implementing authentication protocols signals to receivers your domain is legitimate, compliant, and serious about protecting its reputation.

Audit Health Holistically

As you can see, properly assessing email health requires an extensive audit of critical aspects beyond just deliverability. Authentication, security, website reputation, and DNS configuration all contribute to your domain’s standing.

Regularly checking each metric against best practices identifies gaps needing attention before they undermine deliverability. Monitoring health holistically safeguards your sender reputation.

What metrics or tools have you found most helpful for improving your own domain’s email health? Share your insights and advice in the comments below!

How to Perform an Email Domain Health Check

Now that you know why regular email health checks are essential and the key metrics to examine, let’s walk through the actual process of auditing your domain’s reputation and performance.
Following these steps will provide comprehensive visibility into potential issues impacting your email program before they disrupt deliverability.

Use Online Tools and Checkers

Rather than manually inspecting DNS records and server responses, take advantage of the many excellent online tools purpose-built for email health checks.

These services automate testing of critical parameters like SMTP connections, DNS configuration, and authentication records. They benchmark your domain against best practices for security, deliverability, and compliance.

Some popular options include:

MXToolbox – All-in-one suite for blacklist monitoring, SMTP testing, DNS analysis, and email headers.
MailTester – Deep inspection of DNS and SMTP servers for issues. Provides an overall email score.
ImmuniWeb – Assesses SSL/TLS configuration for email security vulnerabilities.
SenderScore – Tracks global sender reputation and provides email deliverability ratings.

These automated checkers examine in minutes what would take hours manually. They also deliver results in easy to interpret reports highlighting problems.

Review MX Records and DNS Setup

One of the first checks should focus on your core DNS email records that facilitate message routing and delivery.

Examining key parameters like your MX, A, and PTR records validates your mail servers are reachable and able to receive traffic for your domain.

Check that:

Multiple redundant MX records resolve to active mail servers.
A records precisely map hostnames to valid IP addresses.
Reverse DNS PTR records properly align with A records.

Misconfigurations here prevent receivers from connecting to your infrastructure. Use MXToolbox’s MX Lookup to validate your foundation is solid.

Validate SPF, DKIM, and DMARC

The next critical step is confirming your email authentication protocols are properly configured and working as intended.

For each technology:

Check DNS records exist with valid syntax.
Ensure SPF/DKIM alignment and DMARC enforcement.
Use test tools to validate SPF permitted senders and DKIM signature verification.
Adjust policies gradually towards stricter rejections.

Proper authentication is required to avoid spam folders and rejections. Validate your configurations using tools like SPF Surveyor](https://www.spfwizard.net/) and [DMARC Analyzer.

Check Server Response and Web Status

Your mail and web servers represent critical infrastructure underpinning your domain’s legitimacy.

When testing servers:

Verify SMTP servers accept connections on standard ports and offer TLS encryption.
Check banner responses are prompt and hostname verified via reverse DNS.
Confirm web servers are online and load pages quickly via HTTPS.
Ensure domain WHOIS details are populated accurately.

Optimizing server operations demonstrates your domain’s professionalism and commitment to security. Use ImmuniWeb’s tools to check web server hardening.

Scan IP and Domain Against Blacklists

Maintaining awareness of your standings with key email blacklists and blocklists is imperative to delivering to inboxes.

Routinely scan:

Primary mail server IP addresses against major lists like Spamhaus and SORBS.
Web server IP addresses also, since they influence reputation.
Your sending domain name, in case of legacy blocks.

Blacklists provide an early warning system of degradations in reputation. Leverage tools like MXToolbox’s Blacklist Check to know your status.

Test Delivery with Sample Emails

Another way to simulate your domain’s email experience is by sending test messages to major providers and monitoring results.

When testing:

Send plain text emails to Gmail, Outlook, Yahoo, and other large recipients.
Check spam folders in addition to inboxes.
Repeat tests from different sending IP addresses.
Compare opens and clicks to baseline metrics.

Testing real email delivery is the ultimate assessment. Use services like Mail-Tester](https://www.mail-tester.com/) and [Email Marker to simplify sending and reviewing test emails at scale.

Monitor Metrics and History

The final step of health checking is establishing ongoing monitoring to track trends in your domain’s sender reputation and performance.

When monitoring:

Plot key metrics like spam complaints, inbox placement, and bounced messages over time.
Review aggregate authentication failures and DMARC feedback reports.
Compare your sender rating against previous checks and industry averages.
Set email and webhook alerts for surpassing reputation thresholds.

Proactive monitoring gives you an early warning system to avoid disruptive issues. Services like SenderScore provide continuous visibility into your sender rating.

Make Health Checks a Habit

Running through these health check steps monthly gives you the necessary visibility to safeguard deliverability. Stopping issues before they escalate protects your domain’s hard-earned sender reputation.

What additional email health best practices can you suggest based on your own experience and challenges? Please share advice and lessons learned in the comments below!

Improving Your Email Domain Health

Performing routine email health checks aims to identify potential issues early so you can take corrective actions before deliverability suffers. Let’s explore key steps to remediate common problems and build positive domain reputation.

Quickly Delist any Blacklisted IPs

If a health check reveals any of your main mail server IP addresses or web IPs are blacklisted, act swiftly to get delisted. The longer your IPs reside on blacklists, the more potential damage is done to email and website traffic.

To expedite removal:

Identify who maintains the blacklist and their delisting procedures.
Research when and why your IP was added to determine if risky.
Request a delisting following their documented process.
Monitor progress daily until removed.

Refreshing blacklists can take 12-48 hours. Keep requesting until your IP is cleared. Services like Delist Tool help manage the delisting process across major lists.

Set Up Proper SPF, DKIM, and DMARC

If your health check discovered issues with email authentication – incomplete records, misconfigurations, or policy gaps – take steps to strengthen protections.

For each protocol:

Review documentation on proper syntax and formatting.
Audit senders and servers to build complete alignment.
Use tools like SPF Surveyor to validate and troubleshoot records.
Increase DMARC policy strength gradually without breaking mail flow.

With aligned SPF, DKIM, and DMARC bolstering legitimacy, your future emails are better positioned for inbox placement rather than spam folders.

Ensure DNS is Correctly Configured

DNS misconfigurations surfaced in a health check will lead to immediate bouncebacks and lost email. Double check key records.

Look for:

Accurate MX records mapping to active mail servers.
A records precisely associating hostnames and IPs.
Valid rDNS pointers confirming IP ownership.
Properly published authentication records like SPF and DKIM.

Revise any erroneous DNS settings and use tools like DNSPerf to verify corrections deployed. This safeguards routing and authentication.

Maintain Good Web Server Uptime

If health checks flagged your website as suffering from slow speeds or frequent downtime, improving web infrastructure and operations prevents reputation drag.

Investigate and fix root causes like aged servers, traffic spikes, or resource constraints.
Implement monitoring to catch problems proactively.
Consider shifting website hosting to a managed provider with 99.9% uptime.
Regularly check page speed metrics and optimize images/code.

Reliable website operations demonstrate legitimacy and professionalism of your domain overall.

Rotate IP Addresses as Needed

If a history of abuse from prior tenants taints your current IP addresses irreparably, you may need to migration to fresh IPs without adverse history.

Take care when migrating to ensure:

New IPs have no historical listings on blacklists.
Cutover takes place during a maintenance window to avoid lost mail.
Zone records are updated before changing IPs.
Monitoring checks for traffic drops or lost authentication.
Old IPs are maintained for some period to handle delayed messages.

A fresh start on new IPs clears your domain of any lingering past reputational damage.

Monitor Metrics for Early Warning

Ongoing monitoring and risk alerting enables you to nip deliverability issues in the bud before escalating into chronic problems.

Review email engagement metrics like open, clickthrough, and complaint rates for anomalies.
Plot trends in inbox placement rates across major ISPs.
Track your overall sender rating against internal goals and industry averages.
Configure alerts when ratings cross thresholds or blacklists detected.

Proactive monitoring gives you the visibility to course correct quickly at the first signs of trouble. Services like SenderScore provide robust email reputation monitoring.

Warm Up New IPs and Domains

When migrating to new sending infrastructure or establishing new email domains, properly warm them up over time.

Gradually ramp up email volumes on new IPs or domains to build reputation.
Monitor inbox placement rates to benchmark performance.
Continue warming alongside old IPs/domains until ready to fully cutover.
Use dedicated services to pre-warm IPs and domains prior to use.

Warming up is essential to avoid overly aggressive spam filtering when your assets are unknown. Take a slow and steady approach.

Maintain Health to Keep Reaching Inboxes

With inbox clutter at an all-time high, dedicating time to safeguard email sender reputation is just table stakes these days. Regular health checks and prompt remediation will ensure your domain stays off blacklists while providing recipients the safe and consistent email experience they expect.

What other innovative techniques have you found useful for keeping your domain’s email deliverability optimized? Please share your top tips and tricks below!

Email Health Monitoring and Remediation

Checking your email domain health periodically provides a useful snapshot, but can miss short-lived issues arising between assessments. Establishing ongoing monitoring and alerts is key for staying ahead of deliverability threats.
Let’s explore tools and techniques to keep continuous visibility into your sender reputation.

Ongoing Monitoring Tools and Services

Rather than periodic checks, leveraging monitoring systems gives you 24/7 insight into email performance and reputation.

Look for solutions providing:

Holistic metrics – Comprehensive health scoring using key engagement and authentication metrics.
Historical trends – Graphing of performance over days, weeks, and months.
Blacklist monitoring – Real-time alerts when IPs and domain land on blacklists.
Reputation benchmarking – Compare domain sender rating to industry averages.
Customized alerts – Configure notifications for health thresholds or changes.

Top monitoring tools include:

SenderScore – Tracks global sender reputation across ISPs. Provides polarity insights into why scores change.
mboxMonitor – Inbox placement rate monitoring across major ISPs to identify filtering.
Validity – Deep analytics into authentication and security compliance gaps impacting deliverability.

Ongoing visibility enables you to detect issues early before significantly impacting email delivery.

Interpreting and Responding to Issues

Effective monitoring provides awareness, but you still have to interpret signals and know how to respond.

When reviewing your email health reports:

Identify any metrics trending worse – drops in placement rates or engagement.
Research factors driving reputation declines – blacklistings, failed authentications, etc.
Determine if impacts are localized or global based on ISP metrics.
Assign internal resources to investigate root cause and remediate.
Retest specific compliance gaps surfaced through monitoring.

Ideally, have automated playbooks to trigger remediation workflows when alert thresholds are crossed. This facilitates rapid response.

Retesting and Improving Health Scores

Once you’ve remediated an issue surfaced via monitoring, retest that metric to confirm resolutions implemented successfully.

For example:

If blacklisted, rerun blacklist scans after delisting to verify clean.
If authentication failures, revalidate SPF/DKIM/DMARC records corrected.
If engagement dropped, send new test emails to confirm inbox placement restored.

Frequently review overall domain health scores to ensure strengthening trends. Use historical comparisons to benchmark progress.

Warming Up New Assets

When introducing new IP addresses or establishing additional sending domains, warming up properly is critical.

Start sending from new IPs/domains at low volumes to avoid aggressive filtering.
Slowly scale up the quantities and types of mailings over several weeks.
Closely monitor inbox placement rates and adjust warming timelines accordingly.
Continue warming alongside old IPs until ready to fully switch over.

Proper reputation ramping up avoids poor deliverability when assets are unknown by receivers. Don’t rush the process.

Maintaining Positive Reputation

Vigilance is required to maintain strong email sender reputation, as one mishap can significantly set back deliverability. Leveraging robust monitoring and prompt response will help you safeguard domain health.

What tips would you suggest for making monitoring actionable based on your own email program experiences? Please share your advice below to help the community!

Key Takeaways

Maintaining excellent email deliverability through proper domain reputation management takes diligence and vigilance. Let’s recap the core advice from this comprehensive guide:

Perform email health checks regularly to surface potential issues proactively.
Monitor key metrics like blacklists, DNS records, server response, and engagement rates.
Implement email authentication protocols fully – SPF, DKIM, and DMARC.
Use automated tools and checkers to audit records and configurations.
Validate SMTP security, speed, and reverse DNS setup.
Check placement in major ISP spam folders with test emails.
Research and promptly remediate any problems uncovered.
Warm up IP addresses and domains properly before full use.
Establish ongoing monitoring and alerts to detect problems early.
Have documented workflows to respond to and resolve identified issues.
Continuously improve domain reputation through vigilance and learning.

Robust email health checking gives you the visibility needed to recognize vulnerabilities before they disrupt deliverability. Coupled with prompt remediation when problems surface, you can confidently safeguard sender reputation over the long haul.

Consistent inbox placement ensures your messages get seen by recipients and drive business value from your email program. Use these tips and best practices to reach inboxes.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: How often should I perform an email health check?
A: It’s recommended to perform a comprehensive email health check at least monthly. More frequent checks such as weekly are ideal to catch issues early.

Q: What tools do you recommend for email health checking?

A: Top tools include MXToolbox, MailTester, ImmuniWeb, SenderScore, and Validity’s MailboxVision. Each checks various metrics like DNS, blacklists, server response, and authentication.

Q: My IP address is blacklisted – what should I do?

A: First identify the source of the blacklist and their delisting procedures. Then request a removal immediately and keep monitoring until confirmation your IP is delisted.

Q: What is a good SPF policy?

A: Use “v=spf1 -all” to fail any unauthorized sending IPs. List all valid outbound servers under “ip4” or “include” tags.

Q: What is the difference between a hard and soft email bounce?

A: A hard bounce signals a permanent delivery failure such as an invalid recipient. A soft bounce is temporary such as a full inbox. Soft bounces typically resolve themselves.

Q: What is a good DMARC policy?

A: Start with “p=none” to monitor, then move to “p=quarantine” before finally “p=reject” once confident alignment is accurate.

Q: How do I improve poor email engagement?

A: Review subject lines, content, and sending cadence. A/B test different approaches and segment your list by openers. Remove chronic non-openers.

Q: Should I warmup a new IP address before using it?

A: Yes, gradually increase volumes sent from a new IP over several weeks so reputation filters do not block it as high risk.

Q: What is the optimal email authentication setup?

A: Use SPF, DKIM, and DMARC in conjunction, with DKIM matching SPF granularity and DMARC enforcing rejection for failed authentication.