How to Improve Email Deliverability?

One of the greatest challenges most email marketers face today is getting emails delivered to their target recipient’s inbox. It can be discouraging to see most of your emails being spammed, regardless of the time and effort you’ve spent crafting a compelling email. 

To avoid this, you must improve your email deliverability. And in this post, we shall give you the top tips on how to get that done. But first, what’s email deliverability?

Email deliverability can be defined as how successful a sender is when it comes to getting your emails into their target audience’s inboxes. It’s a measure of how well an email can bypass spam filters and other types of blocking mechanisms that may be in place to prevent unwanted or unsolicited emails from reaching the inbox.

When an email is sent, it goes through multiple stages before it reaches the recipient’s inbox. The email first goes through the sender’s email server and then is passed on to the recipient’s email server. Along the way, the email may be checked against spam filters and blocking mechanisms. If the email is deemed spam, it may be blocked or sent to the recipient’s spam folder.

With that said, follow these tips to improve your email deliverability.

Authenticate your emails

Email authentication is the process of confirming the sender’s identity and ensuring that the emails come from a legitimate source. When you authenticate your emails, recipients’ email servers can be sure that the emails are coming from the domain or IP address they claim to be from and not from a malicious or unauthorized source.

Authenticating emails also helps to improve email deliverability by reducing the likelihood that legitimate emails will be marked as spam or blocked by recipients’ email servers. When an email server receives an email that is not authenticated, it may be more likely to assume that the email is spam and take action to block or filter it. However, when an email is authenticated, the server can be more confident that the email is legitimate and, therefore, more likely to deliver it to the recipient’s inbox.

There are several methods for authenticating emails, including SPF (Sender Policy Framework), DKIM (Domain Keys Identified Mail), and DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance). These methods work by adding a digital signature or other types of authentication information to the email header, which can be used to verify the sender’s identity.

Clean your email list

Keeping your email list clean is an essential step in improving email deliverability. Over time, your email list can become cluttered with invalid or inactive email addresses, leading to a high bounce rate and a poor sending reputation. A high bounce rate can indicate to email servers that your emails are not being delivered to valid recipients, and as a result, your future emails may be blocked or filtered as spam.

The best way to clean your email list is to use an email verification tool by Byteplant to remove invalid or inactive email addresses. Invalid email addresses are those that are no longer in use or that have been typed incorrectly. Inactive email addresses are those that have not been engaged with your emails for a certain period. When you remove these addresses from your list, you can reduce the number of bounced emails and increase the chances that your emails will be delivered to active and engaged recipients.

Segment your email list

Email list segmentation is dividing a large email list into smaller, more specific groups of contacts based on certain measures, like demographics, interests, or behavior. When you divide your email list, you can easily tailor your emails to the specific interests and needs of different groups of recipients. And, when you send relevant and targeted messages, you are more likely to engage your recipients and keep them interested in your emails. This, in turn, can help reduce the number of unsubscribes and complaints, which can negatively impact your sending reputation and deliverability.

Segmenting your email list also allows you to send emails at different frequencies to different groups of people. For example, you might send weekly emails to a group of highly engaged contacts and monthly emails to a group of less engaged contacts. This helps to avoid overwhelming people with too many emails and reduces the chances of them marking your emails as spam or unsubscribing.

Use double opt-in

Double opt-in is a process used to confirm that a person has explicitly requested to receive emails from a particular sender. The process involves two steps: a person provides their email address, and then a confirmation email is sent to that address. The person must then click on a link or button in the confirmation email to confirm their request to receive emails.

Double opt-in helps improve email deliverability as it reduces the risk of recipients marking emails as spam. If a person has explicitly requested to receive emails, they are less likely to mark them as spam, which can help to improve the sender’s reputation and reduce the likelihood that future emails will be blocked or filtered. Moreover, it ensures you are sending to valid and active email addresses. When you implement a confirmation step, double opt-in helps to ensure that the email address provided is valid and that the person is actively checking their email. This can help to reduce the number of bounced emails, which can hurt a sender’s reputation.

Lastly, double opt-in helps build a more engaged and responsive list. Studies have revealed that when people have to take an active step to confirm their request to receive emails, they are more likely to be genuinely interested in the content being sent. This can result in a more engaged and responsive list that is more likely to open and interact with emails.

Provide easy unsubscribe options

Providing easy unsubscribe options in your emails is an important aspect of email marketing that helps improve email deliverability and ensures that your recipients are only receiving emails that they are truly interested in. When recipients receive emails they no longer want to receive, they may mark them as spam, which can hurt your sending reputation and reduce the likelihood that your future emails will be delivered to their inbox.

An unsubscribe link is an easy way for recipients to opt out of receiving your emails instead of marking them as spam. This will help to decrease the number of spam complaints and improve the chances of your emails getting delivered to your recipient’s inbox. Additionally, allowing recipients to adjust their email preferences can also be beneficial. This option should allow your recipients to change the type or the frequency of emails they receive from you rather than unsubscribing altogether—and this can help to keep recipients engaged with your content and maintain a positive relationship with them.

Use an email service provider

ESPs handle the technical aspects of sending bulk emails, such as list management, authentication, and deliverability. So, outsourcing your email services to an ESP can be a significant advantage for businesses and organizations that don’t have the resources or expertise to handle these tasks themselves. One of the key benefits of using an ESP is that they handle the process of authenticating emails. ESPs typically use a combination of methods, like SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, to authenticate emails and ensure that they are coming from a legitimate source. By authenticating emails, ESPs can help reduce the likelihood that legitimate emails will be marked as spam or blocked by recipients’ email servers, which can significantly impact email deliverability.

ESPs also provide tools for monitoring and analyzing email performance, such as bounce and complaint rates, which can help businesses identify and address any issues impacting email deliverability. They also provide detailed reporting and analytics on email campaigns, which can help businesses to identify trends, track conversions, and improve future campaigns.

Lastly, using an ESP can help to protect your reputation. ESPs have an established reputation with ISP, meaning emails sent through them are less likely to be marked as spam or blocked by the recipient’s email servers. ESPs also have a dedicated team that monitors their reputation and takes steps to maintain it, so you don’t have to worry about it.

Bottom Line

These are some of the best ways to improve your email deliverability and create a superb email marketing funnel. And the good thing about focusing on your email deliverability is that it can help you increase your engagement rates. Therefore, make sure that you monitor your deliverability and follow these tips if you want your emails to land in your target audience’s inboxes.

(Disclaimer: Devdiscourse's journalists were not involved in the production of this article. The facts and opinions appearing in the article do not reflect the views of Devdiscourse and Devdiscourse does not claim any responsibility for the same.)