How much email traffic does your outgoing mail SMTP server handle regularly? Hundreds? Maybe even thousands?
Sending out a large quantity of mail is an important part of any business.
The last thing you want to see is an ‘unable to send’ message. It is far from rare for a number of messages to fail when sending mail in bulk.
Just imagine if a significant percentage of mail fails to be delivered. This could become a real problem especially if your mail has been labeled as spam.
In the modern world upwards of 80% of all email sent is classified as spam. Almost everybody with an email address will do their best to evade spam. There are countless filters designed to block spam emails and email providers do their best to make it difficult for spam to get into your inbox. This can be detrimental to any authentic mail you may wish to send out.
This can make you quite upset. I might be able to help you take advantage of anti-spam filters and get your outgoing mail SMTP server set up properly. With an adequately configured server, anti-spam filters can let your emails through and not label them as spam.
Let us first take a moment to study the diagram located below. It shows you what steps an email makes when you try to send it.
This is only true if your email list is a completely legal opt-in list and if your messages are not truly spam. If you do not meet both of these standards, the following rules will not be of much use for you.
There are five easy rules to keep in mind to get your emails through. With the help of these rules, your emails can be verified as legitimate and get into a person’s inbox. You have to get their anti-spam filters to trust you. Your trust score will go down if you start sending emails it deems suspicious; with a low enough score, you’ll never be able to send emails.
As you begin to set up your outgoing mail SMTP server and start bulk mailing, these are the steps you need to take:
- Acquire your own Static IP address;
- Build a forward and reverse DNS resolution;
- Look at blacklists
- Construct an SPF; and
- Possibly construct Domain Keys.
You might not be familiar with all these technical terms, but it’s a lot easier than you think, as you’ll learn in the steps below.
Acquire a static IP
The majority of regular Internet providers fail to give you this just for being a customer. Typically, a floating (dynamic) IP address is assigned, which changes each time you connect to the Internet. Keeping track of the address is like trying to hit a moving target. This makes the majority of email servers reject any bulk emails originating from a dynamic IP. Therefore, your first step is to contact your Internet provider and request a static IP address.
Dynamic Name System (DNS)
The next step is to manage your forward and reverse DNS resolution. DNS resolution is the process in which a client will query a server in order to gather the IP address and create a connection. If this query fails to gain a reply from the local domain it will query a parent server that does reply.
If your DNS resolution is set up correctly it will validate the relationship between your domain name and the IP address of your SMTP server. This authentication will increase the trust score of your mail.
It is a failsafe designed to make you discoverable by your domain name if you were to start spamming. Most phishers or spammers will be unwilling to reveal their real name and prefer the use of hacked or stolen IP addresses and domains. It is not possible to register a domain without an ID, such as a credit card.
A records and their counterpart PTR records are what make forward and reverse DNS resolutions possible. It is important you add A and PTR records to your DNS, without them DNS lookups are not possible. They will also aid with other work you may do online. You should request your service provider or domain name registrar to take care of this for you. A result is increased trust with filters and providers.
It is important to remember that arranging the ‘A record’ does not automatically dictate that the PTR record has been arranged correctly. Be certain to double check with your provider.
Black-list
With the use of DNS queries you can access DNS blacklists, sometimes referred to as blocklists. The DNS blacklists are IP addresses stored in a remote database This is a list of IP addresses known to be the origins of spam. Filters and providers will look at the blacklist and block any mail coming from an IP address on the list.
If your mail is being blocked you can check the blacklist site. If you find your IP address to be on the site you can manually remove it from the majority of blacklist sites.
SPF
You may not know what SPF is. Unlike DNS, SPF is not required but is in fact useful. SPF validates whether or not a host is able to send emails for a particular domain. SPF allows filters to decide if your IP allows you to send messages for certain domains. If your IP is different than that designated then it will mark your mail as spam or delete it altogether.
If you’re on the SPF record, servers can verify that your messages are legitimate. Check out Openspf.org, which can tell you everything you need to know about SPF and how you can use it to your full advantage. Get your SPF set up through your domain registrar or provider. Their configuration panel might have wizards that can help you. You can get automatic SPF setup for your emails.
Configuring Domain Keys (optional)
If you feel you need additional help, you can use this lesser known standard for inspection. It’s debatable whether or not it can help you. Not very many providers check it anyway.
The intention of domain keys is to help recognize who sends what mail. Domain keys are similar to SPF, it works by adding cryptography to mail in order to make it possible for only the intended person to send a particular email.
While Domain Keys is not a spam filter by itself, you will be able to see that if you show a correct domain, all filtering mechanisms will work more proficiently. This will prevent them from classifying you as a spammer.
So that is the five easy tips completed. Hopefully it has now become clear that taking the time to look into certain options will help your mail get to where it needs to be.
When setting up your own outgoing SMTP server you can now be sure you have done all you can to side step those spam filters, keep your data as open as possible and you will be viewed as trustworthy.
While these rules can appear to be difficult, by following them you will see they are both easy and rewarding.
Learn more about Smtp2Go. Stop by Tyson Griffen’s site where you can find out all about Smtp2Go Review and what it can do for you.