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SaaS Yacht Club

Topics / Email deliverability

Deliverability: getting outbound into the inbox

Mailbox providers now enforce authentication and complaint limits instead of just recommending them. Cold email that isn't authenticated, aligned and wanted gets foldered or rejected, which makes infrastructure the first thing to fix before copy.

In the club

Counted across 255,431 messages from 1,844 members. Nobody is named or quoted.

Tools discussed

  • Smartlead1,934 ↓
  • Instantly450 ↓
  • Warmly13

What people ask for help with

  • Email deliverability & inbox placement1000%

Share of 497 sampled questions

Why it matters

Email deliverability and inbox placement is one of the top problems members ask the club about. Mistakes are expensive: a burned domain or mailbox can take weeks to recover.

What practitioners should know

  1. 01

    Authenticate and align

    Publish SPF and DKIM, add a DMARC record, and make sure the visible From domain aligns with one of them.

  2. 02

    Keep complaints low

    Providers publish spam-rate limits for bulk senders. Stay well under them and monitor with the providers' own postmaster tools.

  3. 03

    Protect the main domain

    Most teams send cold email from separate, warmed domains and mailboxes, with modest daily volume per mailbox.

  4. 04

    Verify lists before sending

    High bounce rates damage reputation quickly, so lists are verified before every campaign.

Worth reading

  • Email sender guidelines - Gmail Help

    Google's official sender requirements for personal Gmail accounts, with a baseline for all senders and a stricter tier for senders of 5,000 or more messages per day.

    support.google.com

  • Email sender guidelines FAQ - Gmail Help

    Google's FAQ on enforcement: how bulk senders are defined, how spam rate is measured and when mitigation support is withdrawn.

    support.google.com

  • Sender Best Practices | Sender Hub

    Yahoo's official sender requirements page listing rules for all senders and bulk senders, including SPF, DKIM and DMARC authentication.

    senders.yahooinc.com

  • Outlook's New Requirements for High-Volume Senders

    Microsoft's announcement of SPF, DKIM and DMARC requirements for domains sending high volumes to Outlook.com, Hotmail and Live addresses.

    techcommunity.microsoft.com

  • Policies | Outlook Postmaster

    Outlook postmaster policy page summarizing the stricter authentication standards for high-volume senders.

    postmaster.outlook.com

Research gathered Sep 29.

Questions to be able to answer

  • Is every sending domain you use aligned for DMARC today?
  • How do you catch a reputation drop before replies fall?

Club numbers as of Oct 24. Words are reviewed before they go live. Links go to their publishers.