Imagine that you created a very ideal subject line, chose the best sender name in the world, but when a user opens an email newsletter, he sees a broken template that certainly does not encourage reading, and even more so to buy. Why is this happening?
Because, unlike web development, there are no universal HTML standards among email clients, which makes the job of marketers even more challenging. After all, you need to follow the rules of different mailers so that the adaptive layout looks the way it was intended. Therefore, it is so important to test the layout of letters before sending them.
A true professional is capable of synthesizing new knowledge. All those who have higher education know that the most important thing is to master the concepts of the industry and learn how to work with them. This is the only way a person becomes a professional and is able to generate new ideas. For this, we have compiled a list of terms that you will need when working with email deliverability tests such as Folderly. It is a product of b2b lead generation company – Belkins, their product promises to improve the deliverability of your emails.
Why do you need to know them?
- You will understand how to properly begin email deliverability testing.
- You will outline actions to advance the protection of your email and set secure communication between you and your recipients.
- If you’ve hired a team to administrate your coverage, you can quickly guide mailbox engineers on issues that affect your productivity.
- You will have a better knowledge of how email transmission works and how users are identified.
Definitions of Email Deliverability Test: the Alphabetical List
Blacklist
If you send spam, a personal user can add you to a blacklist, he won’t see your emails anymore. This is an example of the private blacklist, but if you get into a public blacklist, this information is shared to mail providers and spam filters. Subsequently, your emails will be rejected. Don’t send spam if you are trying to have a good email open rate.
CNAME
The CNAME record allows you to assign a different address or hostname to a domain or subdomain.
This record can be used for a variety of purposes. For example: If you are worried that someone is registering your domain incorrectly in the address bar as ww.yoursite.som or wwww.yoursite.som, this will usually result in an error. To overcome this, you can set your domain CNAME records so that even if the address is entered incorrectly, visitors will still be redirected to your website.
DKIM
Mail with identification keys DomainKeys or DKIM is an encrypted signature in the header of incoming emails. DKIM, visible only to receiving servers, certifies that the message was sent by an authenticated user and has not been modified.
DMARC
Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting and Conformance) is a policy that shows how to deal with emails that fail SPF and DKIM checks.
DNS
It is a technology that helps the browser to find the correct site by the domain name. It is inconvenient for people to use long combinations of numbers, so they came up with the idea of associating IP addresses with clear text names – domains. Still, remembering google.com is easier than 216.58.209.14.
Domain reputation
This is the opinion of the mail provider (gmail.com, yahooo.com, etc.) about the email delivery domain that sends the letters. It affects how the letters get into the Inbox folder, and hence the effectiveness of email marketing in general. The reputation of a domain consists of many factors.
ESP
An ESP or email service provider is an organization that offers a wide range of email marketing deliverability services such as template creation, template testing, mailing mechanisms, spam testing, etc.
Internet service provider
A service provider provides Internet access. It’s like a supermarket: it provides services that it does not produce itself, but buys in bulk. The provider is an intermediary. He buys traffic in one place and sells it to the subscriber.
IP reputation
It is an integrated metric, constantly updated that allows you to determine if there is a high chance of spam or unsolicited mailing from a specific IP address. Different services use different algorithms for calculating IP reputation. But there are some general factors that affect this rate. You begin building your IP reputation from the moment you start sending messages. Sending to invalid emailing addresses is an activity bad for your reputation. Usually, email deliverability test results show that you shouldn’t exceed the daily message limit but you should use a clean mailing list instead. This is improving your reputation and trust.
MTA reputation
Many users learn about the reputation of the Message Transfer Agent (MTA) after trying to send a message and receiving a 554 error notification that says, “Your access to this mail system has been denied due to the bad reputation of the sending MTA.” This means that they sent an email from an IP address that was blacklisted by the receiving server.
Sender reputation
Sender Reputation evaluates all statistics and calculates the SRL value for each sender. Sender reputation is a number between 0 and 9 that represents the likelihood that a particular sender is the source of spam or some other malicious user, so you should look at its fundamental components – IP reputation and domain reputation when working with an email deliverability test.
SMTP
SMTP, short for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol, governs the transfer of electronic messages over a TCP / IP network. SMTP is the most common communication protocol used by a large number of messaging agents and email delivery servers, so almost all anti-spoofing and email protection protocols are adapted to it.
SPF Record
SPF record is added in the same way as a regular A, MX, or CNAME record.
This is a DNS record that contains a list of trusted servers from which mail for this domain can be sent, and information about the mechanism for processing mail sent from other servers. Correct SPF settings will reduce the likelihood of cybercriminals sending spam on your behalf.
Spoofing
The practice of attackers disguising themselves as a specific user or device connected to the network in order to steal data, distribute malware or bypass access control mechanisms. The most common forms of spoofing are IP spoofing, email spoofing, and DNS spoofing.
White list
Quite the opposite of a blacklist, a whitelist is a list of identified users and businesses that have proven themselves trustworthy and have instant access to the mail system. In terms of email reach, emails sent from a whitelisted domain skip the filter check and go straight to recipients’ inboxes.
Email marketing deliverability issues can be fixed with a free trial
We hope this quick guide will help you deal with all the odd terms and acronyms as you put your awareness campaign together. However, once you get started, you may run into some problems with the terminology mentioned above.
This is why we suggest purchasing a proper analytics and monitoring service. Our free trial of Folderly provides a wide range of tools and features to help you understand your deliverability and fix issues in the bud while keeping your budget on track.
