DMARC and Deliverability

The spam score of an inbound email is evaluated based on several key factors.

DMARC and Deliverability

A DMARC pass is a significant step towards improving your email deliverability, but it doesn’t guarantee that your email will not go to spam.

While DMARC is an essential part of email authentication and can significantly improve your chances of avoiding the spam folder, it’s just one piece of the puzzle. Ensuring high-quality content, maintaining a good sender reputation, and encouraging positive engagement are also crucial.

Below are some important factors to be aware of that can impact your deliverability

1. Sender Reputation

• IP Address Reputation: Email servers track the reputation of IP addresses. If an IP address has been associated with spam in the past, emails from that address are more likely to be flagged.
• Domain Reputation: Similar to IP reputation, the domain from which the email is sent is also evaluated. Domains with a history of sending spam or having low engagement rates are penalized.

2. Content Quality

• Keywords and Phrases: Certain words and phrases are commonly associated with spam (e.g., “free”, “win”, “guarantee”). The presence of these can increase the spam score.
• Links and URLs: Emails containing links to known malicious sites or too many links can be flagged. Shortened URLs are also scrutinized.
• Attachments: Emails with attachments, especially executable files (.exe), are often flagged as spam.

3. Engagement Levels

• Open Rates: Low open rates can indicate that recipients are not interested in the emails, which can negatively impact the sender’s reputation.
• Click-Through Rates: Similar to open rates, low click-through rates can be a red flag.
• Spam Complaints: High rates of recipients marking emails as spam will increase the spam score.

4. Email Authentication

• SPF (Sender Policy Framework): Ensures that the email is sent from an authorized server. Proper SPF records can improve deliverability.
• DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail): Adds a digital signature to verify that the email has not been altered in transit.
• DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance): Builds on SPF and DKIM to provide a comprehensive authentication framework.

5. Technical Factors

• DNS Settings: Proper DNS configuration is crucial. Misconfigured DNS settings can lead to higher spam scores.
• IP Blacklisting: If the sending IP is on a blacklist, emails from that IP are more likely to be flagged.

6. Formatting and Structure

• HTML and Text Balance: A good balance between HTML and plain text is important. Emails that are too image-heavy or have poorly formatted HTML can be flagged.
• HTML Errors: Errors in the HTML code can indicate a poorly constructed email, which can increase the spam score.

7. Spam Filter Rules

• Email Security Solutions: Many email security solutions employ spam filters that use a variety of tests to evaluate emails. Each test assigns a score, and the total score determines whether the email is flagged as spam.
• Custom Rules: Different email service providers have their own rules and algorithms for detecting spam. These can include proprietary scoring systems like Microsoft’s Spam Confidence Level (SCL) and Bulk Complaint Level (BCL).

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