When outgoing mail is being rejected as spam/junk by our server, you can take action to review your domain's DNS records, reduce your spam score, and improve your chances of sending messages successfully.
- Send a test email
- Confirm your SPF and DKIM records are valid
- Check the health of your IP address
- Review your emailing habits
Send a test email
The internet offers many 3rd party tools to help you improve the quality of your outgoing email.
Here's a 3rd party spam scoring website you can use to get information on your outgoing email, including ensuring email authentication records like SPF and DKIM are valid.
- Visit the newsletters spam test site and copy the test email address provided by clicking the
symbol.
- Send a simple email to the test email address provided.
- Return to the newsletters spam test site. Click Then check your score to see your results after allowing adequate time for the email to deliver and be processed.
- Your email will be scored and displayed to you.
Confirm your SPF and DKIM records are valid
To improve the odds that your email will land in the recipient's inbox instead of their spam folder, review essential DNS records on your domain: SPF and DKIM.
In addition to scoring your email, the spam score report provides details about the status of your SPF and DKIM records.
Note: Please also refer to our complete guide on setting up SPF records and coordinate with our support team to complete the configuration of your DKIM settings.
- Click You're (not) fully authenticated.
- Review the details to find the current status of your SPF and DKIM records.
Check the health of your IP address
If an IP is misconfigured or is on a public blocklist such as SORBS or Abusix, any mail you send from your connection using that address may be immediately rejected, no matter what you try to send.
If you find your IP address is misconfigured or is on public blocklists, reach out to your ISP with the information so they can take action and help you get a new IP address assigned to your connection.
Only the owner of the IP address - your internet provider - can work with the blocklist companies to get the IP cleared.
Our support team cannot and will not safelist IP addresses on public blocklists.
- Visit the ifconfig.me website, and copy your connection's IP address.
- Check if the IP is on a blocklist by entering it into the Server IP or Domain field on mxtoolbox.com/blacklists.aspx, clicking Blacklist check to search.
- Check to see if your IP address is configured correctly by entering your IP address into the form at mxtoolbox.com/ReverseLookup.aspx and clicking Reverse lookup. A correctly configured IP address will show a full hostname in the Domain name result.
Review your emailing habits
While many aspects of spam filtering cannot be disclosed and are unknown to our team, we can share some everyday emailing habits that are known to increase spam scores.
| Do | Don't |
Use lowercase letters or a mixture of uppercase and lowercase letters in your subject line. |
Use all capital letters in your subject line. |
| Trim any extra spaces out of your subject line. | Use extra spacing in your subject line, especially at the start or end. |
| Trim the body of your message to include only relevant parts of the reply chain history. | Send messages with extensive reply histories attached. |
| Keep your attachments small - 27MB or less is our recommended limit. | Send attachments over 27MB in size. Upload them to Google Drive or DropBox and send a link. |
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