We intended to provide a helpful guide for you to enjoy and use in your Email Marketing Strategy. Firstly, it’s a warning card for those who still don’t care about their domain name and IP reputation when they send email marketing campaigns that think they’re safe for using an external platform.
So, if you want to be informed and prevent mishaps on your brand and domain name reputation, read this cheat sheet very carefully.
What’s a Domain Name and IP Reputation?
As you may already read somewhere, email marketing deliverability is quite different from the good old days when you needed to take care of:
- acquisition method;
- have correct certification seals;
- eventually, pay a good email marketing provider to reach your customers.
You could use simple software with your email list all inserted in and blast away even before that.
Since the spammers have become smart and with more resources to cheat the spam filters, the ESP (Email Service Providers, like Gmail and Yahoo! Mail) needed to take charge of their systems and deliver a better email experience to their users. Ultimately, the ESP want to provide the right messages to their user’s inbox. The other junk messages are sent to the oblivion of SPAM folders or even “less important” visual filters.
They catch spam messages and filter legitimate commercial messages from you. Even if you practice an excellent Permission-Based acquisition tactic, these filter algorithms can still hurt you.
These filters have their foundation on a hundred separated metrics, but all resumes to a key one: Your Domain Name and IP Reputation.
So, to take advantage of that information and understand how that algorithm works, making sure these threads don’t catch you, check some of the critical factors that influence your Domain Name and IP Reputation bellow.
Start Your Week With Insights 💡
Bounce Rate affects your Domain Name and IP Reputation.
Check your Bounce-Rate continuously, and Please, Please, Please, clean your database periodically. Even if everyone has subscribed to your list, you must keep it cleaned. And why do you need to do that, you might ask?
Have you imagined the number of resources needed to deliver tens of millions of emails every month in a service like Gmail or Yahoo! Mail, for instance? And all of that is all to waste since it ends on nobody for real. So, what they’ll do? They start to filter your emails as a punishment since you’re a naughty boy that “refuses to clean your room”. Do you want to be grounded? Then start to clean your list.
Check your email statistics and separate your bounce users into a reactivation list or even inactive them for not to be used in the future in regular campaigns. It will make your list shorter but more engaging and profitable.
Unsubscribe Rate affects your Domain Name and IP Reputation.
It is normal. If you’re sending something that isn’t in the subscriber’s interest, they may be able to unsubscribe from your list. And if the rate is abnormal, that will reflect on your sender’s reputation as well.
So, to tackle this is relatively easy: send something that people will really enjoy and even share. Check if it’s good enough before sending anything.
On the other hand, try not to be difficult so that people use the unsubscribe button. It is still a better option than the next point below.
Spam Complaints affects your Domain Name and IP Reputation.
Yep, if people don’t find your unsubscribe button easily, they will use the ESPs default one. And if the Email Provider sees a suspecting high number of spam complaints, they will block your further sendings without mercy. Hey, you’re sending something that people don’t want to receive, so get over it.
Again, make the unsubscribe button quite visible instead of hiding it. Even if your unsubscribe metrics go high, it’s better than a spam complaint rate. No question about it!
Make also sure that the automated unsubscribe button is actually working. Sometimes, people make a spam complaint when they try to use the unsubscribe one, and it doesn’t work.
Usually, if this rate comes up higher than 0,05% of the total of emails sent, you should worry. So stay tuned on this.
Inactive Users
Make a simple filter within your Email Marketing Platform and select those that didn’t open or click on any of the last 5 to 10 emails you’ve sent before. Get a huge number? Don’t worry about that. Pass them all into a separated list for re-engagement tactics, but please separate it from your usual active database even if this cuts your database in half.
If your metrics start to be really good, this will turn every new user from the different ESPs to get your messages. And by small steps, even the other inactive ones can get active if you deal with the Domain Name & IP Reputation first hand.
Remember that those dormant users can be what we call Spam Traps from the different ESPs. Know what this is? It is a way for them to check if you’re a caring company that periodically cleans their lists. They get you through and reach your subscribers in premium space in exchange. It would be much more profitable to reach the inbox since the rules and filters already blocked all of the other competitors and spam messages. So take advantage, do the right thing and profit from it.
Engagement Rate
All of the other techniques focused on the negative aspects of email marketing. This one is all about the positive side of it. The Engagement rate is something that the ESPs are reading closely. If you engage your subscribers with really excellent content and can’t wait but to open your email message and click within, you’re on that particular group of desired senders.
They will treasure you and keep everyone happy—your subscribers with the messages they want and you with the privileged space to deliver them.
To do so, you must take the place of your subscriber’s advocate and think of what they will crave for more. Focus on that, create great subject lines that will direct them to open the message and then deliver what you promised on the subject line. Even better, surprise them by providing so much more than you’ve promised. Over-deliver and they will become your advocates and will share your message. You want them to share and spread the word, don’t you? Place the necessary tools to make them do just that in the message itself and the links within your content. Leverage that goodwill to your advantage.
Bottom Line for a good Domain Name and IP Reputation
- Respect Your Subscribers
- Create Great Content
- Deliver What You’ve Promised
- Clean Your List
- Surprise Them With More
- Make Their Life Easier
- Place Yourself on the Subscriber’s Shoes
- Respect Your Subscribers (Yes, I know that’s duplicated – it’s intended that way;-P )
Do you do all of these procedures usually? Do you like to add anything more to the community? Please, be welcome to share your thoughts in the comment section.
Thank you again for your time in reading this article.