Set Yourself Up for Successful Deliverability

Learning Objectives

After completing this unit, you’ll be able to:

Describe the methods of authenticating a domain in Marketing Cloud Engagement.
Determine whether a dedicated or shared sending IP is best for your company.

Importance of Authentication

To improve the likelihood that your email gets to the intended recipient, emails must be properly authenticated, not just validated. Google, Yahoo, and other mailbox providers take authentication seriously. They check for all industry-accepted forms of authentication using DNS records of your sending domain. Additionally, authentication reduces the likelihood of spam, spoofing, and phishing attacks, thus protecting your brand and reducing spam complaints.

Methods of Authenticating a Domain for Use on Marketing Cloud Engagement

Sender Authentication Package (SAP)

An SAP configured for Salesforce Marketing Cloud Engagement ensures you have compliant, authenticated email messages when sending from our platform.

But what exactly do you get with an SAP? An SAP is a collection of products, including an authenticated private domain along with link and image wrapping (that is, branding), a dedicated IP address, and reply mail management (RMM). While some of these products can be purchased individually, an SAP is best thought of as an account branding tool, as link and image wrapping is only offered with an SAP setup.

Private Domain

Message authentication helps mailbox providers know that your sends are legitimate. Private Domain is a paid product that provides Sender Policy Framework (SPF), DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM), and Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance (DMARC) authentication to your Marketing Cloud Engagement sending domain.

Sender Policy Framework (SPF) is a DNS-based email authentication feature that allows senders to publish a list of IP addresses that are used for sending.
DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) signs messages with a cryptographic signature that verifies the domain and prevents spoofing.

Together, these authentication methods satisfy Domain-based Message Authentication Reporting & Conformance. DMARC is a protocol that determines the authenticity of an email message. A properly configured DMARC policy can tell a receiving server whether or not to accept email from a particular center. Not all receiving servers perform a DMARC check before accepting a message, but most major mailbox providers do.

Get to Know IPs

You can’t learn about deliverability without discussing IPs and IP warming. Whether you’re new to Marketing Cloud Engagement or a seasoned professional, it’s good to review how IPs impact deliverability.

Shared IP vs. Dedicated IP

First, let’s start by understanding when you should consider a dedicated IP address over using a shared IP address.

Shared IP sending is recommended for low-volume senders who otherwise wouldn’t be able to establish their own sending reputation due to consistently low volumes or the sporadic nature of their sending. Mailbox providers are looking for a consistent mail flow to extract engagement-related data points from (commonly referred to as “reputation”). Sharing sending IP(s) with other Marketing Cloud Engagement customers offers a solution to keep volume and reputation on the sending IP(s).

Most customers will have a need for a dedicated IP address. Any customer sending more than 100,000 messages per month will benefit from a dedicated sending IP. This allows you full control of the sending reputation tied to your outbound mail, which factors into the ability to reach the inbox of your subscribers. And if you’re sending more than 2 million messages per day, you will need more than one IP address. (Sending more than 2 million messages a day from a single IP can result in deferrals by major mailbox providers.)

Get Started with a New IP Address

If you’re a new Marketing Cloud Engagement customer or adding a new IP to an existing account, you should know that your purchased IP address is unused, with no email sending history or sender reputation. This means there is no such thing as a pre-warmed IP. Since spammers often use new IP addresses, mailbox providers limit the amount of emails they accept from IPs with no sender reputation. Emails coming from a cold IP address cause concern and are carefully observed for unusual or high-volume activity. So what should you do?

IP Warming

IP warming is the process of gradually increasing the volume of mail sent by a new IP address. The goal is to build up at least 30 days of desirable sending history so that mailbox providers have an idea of the kinds of mail coming from your new IP address. Basically, it’s your chance to build your reputation as a desirable sender. The ramp-up period can take longer than 30 days for some senders and a shorter time for others. Factors such as your overall list size, list quality, send frequency, and subscriber engagement can influence the amount of time it takes for your IP address to be fully ramped up.

Keep Learning

Deliverability isn’t just something you learn and then forget about. It’s truly continuing education, because it requires continuous learning. You can have the best deliverability one month, and then—poof—something happens. More than 300 spam-filtering companies exist with different filtering logic. It’s hard to keep up with these changes. In the next unit, explore best practices to help you maintain good deliverability, stay out of spam folders, and maintain a favorable IP reputation.

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