How to check and improve email deliverability

As you read this article, you will learn how to measure your email deliverability and troubleshoot various factors that affect whether your emails reach the Inbox.

How to start Deliverability Check –> 

How to review test results (with tips to improve deliverability) –>

What is email deliverability

Email deliverability, is the email’s ability to reach the Inbox and avoid filters that would direct it to the Promotions, Categories, or Spam folders.

With Snov.io’s Deliverability check, you can make sure your email domain’s technical settings are correct, check that your email content won’t trigger spam filters, and see how likely your emails are to land in the inbox.

It’s a good practice to check your deliverability before launching any campaign and during active campaigns if you notice certain metrics are lower than expected.

It’s recommended to run a deliverability check if:

• Your email open rate is below 30%.
• Your bounce rate is above 10%.

Step 1: Create a test

In your Snov.io account, find the Deliverability –> tab in the menu at the top.

On the Deliverability Check page, click New test.

Step 2: Choose email account

On the test settings page, select the email account from the pop-up window. The list will include all accounts previously connected to Snov.io.

Step 3: Choose sending strategy

Here you can choose how you want to perform the test. The strategy you select will determine how the test emails are sent.

A quick test: All test emails are sent without an interval between them. We’ll add all test recipients as CC (carbon copy) recipients and analyze their email placement.

A real campaign simulation: Test emails will be sent with a 10-second delay between each email. A test with a delay between emails provides more accurate results, as it simulates the real way of sending campaigns.

Step 4: Add email content

Next, add the email content for the test. Select from the following options:

Option 1: AI-powered (default)

This option uses AI-generated content in the test emails.

Best for: If you want to test the overall condition of your email account.

Option 2: Custom email

Use this option to test the actual email you plan to use in your campaigns. Add images, links, and attachments to check for any potential issues.

Best for: Testing the email copy you plan to use in campaigns and checking how well it is delivered.

Step 5: Start test

Snov.io conducts the test by sending a series of emails from your account to our specially maintained test mailboxes. These mailboxes are regularly updated and verified to ensure accuracy.

Each test costs 25 credits from your balance. If the test cannot start due to connectivity issues with your mailbox, the credits will be refunded.

Step 6: Review test results

During the test, we analyze multiple factors such as your sender reputation, your domain’s DNS settings, and the email content. By reviewing the test results, you can fix the issues that cab affect your email placement in real campaigns.

The test results provide two key metrics:

–> (1) Domain health:

Domain health score reflects the technical condition and trustworthiness of your email domain.

It is calculated based on the status and accuracy of DNS records — they are used for email authentication and increase your sender reputation.

 

–> (2) Email placement:

Email placement score shows how your test emails were categorized.

The Inbox score shows the percentage of emails that went to the main Inbox folder.

Advanced test results

Here we provide detailed information for each metric separately.

–> Domain health

In this section, you can see the status of your domain’s DNS records.

Email providers consider domains with valid DNS records as more reliable, confirming that an email is sent from a trusted sender.

If any parameter is missing, click on the corresponding section to view instructions on how to set it up.

–> Email placement

In this section, you can view the folders where your test emails were delivered:

• Inbox: The ideal destination for an email’s visibility.
• Categories: Indicates your email is seen as promotional.
• Spam: Potential issues with email content or sender reputation.
• Not Delivered: Your test emails were rejected by the receiving email server.

The test mailboxes include several popular email providers: Google Workspace, Microsoft, Namecheap (Private Email), Zoho, Amazon Workmail. They are selected due to their widespread use.

This helps you effectively track and optimize how your emails perform across different email clients.

–> Email content

In this section, you can see what in your email’s content affects its deliverability and how to prevent it from being flagged as spam.

• Email content for spam-triggering words: Our system scans for specific words or phrases that could activate spam filters.
• Image size and format: We ensure that your images are of the optimal size and format. This is important for quick loading and correct display on the recipients’ screens.
• Added links: We confirm that all inserted links are accurate and work correctly when clicked.

What’s next:

Remember, real-campaign situations are tougher than test conditions, and there are additional factors that should not be ignored.

To be fully prepared for campaigns:

1. Do regular deliverability checks before launching campaigns and while sending them.
2. Always do a proper warm-up period –>
3. If you have multiple sender accounts, use Mailbox rotation –> and do deliverability checks for each of them. 

Here are some additional tips to achieve best results in campaigns:

1) Send campaigns to targeted leads

Don’t send generic emails to random prospects.

Learn how to collect your leads based on your ideal customer profile –>

Accurate lead targeting + relevant email content =  increase in engagement → increase in reputation → increase in deliverability.

2) Be consistent in email sending volumes

Don’t overload your sender accounts. ESPs (Email Service Providers) and spam filters view the sending of large volumes of emails daily as spamming.

A safe volume per account to avoid risking the sender’s reputation is 50-100 emails per day.

3) Maintain positive sender reputation

Your sender reputation is a score that email providers assign to your domain – the higher the score is, the more likely you’ll land in the inbox.

To build a good reputation:

• focus on getting more replies –>
• follow best practices to avoid spam filters –>

If you have a question that we haven’t covered, feel free to reach out to our Customer Care team. You can contact us at help@snov.io or through live chat. We’re here to assist you!