Email remains an essential communication tool for businesses, organisations, and individuals alike. However, for bulk senders, merely sending emails does not guarantee delivery to intended recipients. Understanding the factors affecting inbox placement is vital for those using email marketing to reach their target audience effectively. In this post, we’ll address common concerns regarding email deliverability and discuss strategies to ensure messages reach the inbox instead of being lost in the spam folder, unseen and unread.

Reaching the inbox

Ensuring your emails land in the recipient’s inbox is a top priority for marketers. Think of email deliverability as embarking on a road trip, with the recipient’s inbox as your desired destination. You want your email to arrive safely and be seen by the recipient, just like reaching your destination on a road trip.

Similar to driving a car, various factors influence whether you reach your destination successfully. If you lack a well-maintained vehicle, don’t know how to drive, or are unfamiliar with the rules of the road, you’re unlikely to arrive on time. But fear not, we’re here to assist you!

Your email service provider (ESP) serves as the vehicle you’re driving. ESPs like Create to Generate work tirelessly to ensure emails flow smoothly and reach their destination. 

Sender reputation

Just as adhering to traffic rules and driving responsibly ensures a safe journey, maintaining a positive sender reputation is essential for successful email deliverability. Your sender reputation functions much like a driving licence—it reflects your email sending history and indicates how trustworthy you are as a sender.

Mailbox Providers (MBPs) act as traffic controllers and utilise spam filters to determine which emails can smoothly pass through and which ones need to be stopped. They assess various data points to determine the credibility of your email, including past and current subscriber engagements, list quality, domain reputation, authentication protocols, tracking links, destination links, email content, and IP reputation, among others.

Here are five steps you can implement to protect your sender reputation:

1. Ensure you only email individuals who have expressly opted into your email list.
2. Establish DKIM authentication within your account, granting authorization for us to send emails on your behalf.
3. Exercise caution when modifying your sending domain, send frequency, and list volume.
4. Maintain regular sending schedules to sustain engagement and naturally filter out inactive subscribers.
5. Re-engage with dormant contacts before removing them to uphold a healthy email list.

User engagement and prospect list quality

When recipients actively engage with emails—opening, reading, and interacting with the content—it sends positive signals to Mailbox Providers (MBPs). These actions are interpreted as evidence of the sender’s credibility and relevance, setting them apart from spammers or irrelevant senders.

A high level of engagement indicates that recipients derive value from your emails, fostering trust and enhancing your sender reputation. This, in turn, increases the likelihood of your emails landing in the inbox.

Conversely, a lack of engagement—such as emails remaining unopened, deleted without being read, or marked as spam—sends negative signals to MBPs. This can diminish your reputation and result in more emails being filtered to the junk folder.

Proactively removing dormant or disinterested subscribers helps maintain a high-quality list, leading to improved engagement, better deliverability, and ultimately, higher returns on your email marketing efforts.

Metrics of deliverability

Monitoring deliverability metrics in your email campaigns is akin to navigating with a GPS during a drive. Just as you rely on real-time information to make informed decisions about your route, analysing deliverability metrics provides invaluable insights into the health and performance of your email campaigns.

Here are five key deliverability metrics to keep a close eye on:

1. open rates
2. click rates
3. Unsubscribe rate
4. Spam complaint rates
5. Bounce rates

To learn more about those statistics, we have a detailed blog here Essential Conversion Metrics for Cold Email Campaigns

By regularly tracking these metrics, you can gauge the effectiveness of your email campaigns and make necessary adjustments to optimise their performance.

Maintaining a data-driven mindset ensures that you stay on the right track and enables you to make adjustments as needed to maximise reach and engagement with your target audience. With a clear understanding of your campaign’s performance metrics, you can navigate your email marketing efforts towards greater success.

Successful email marketing

Achieving success with email marketing requires a comprehensive understanding and prioritisation of key aspects, particularly email deliverability. The inbox serves as the ultimate destination for your emails, offering your content the chance to be seen and engaged with by your audience.

The Create to Generate team is well-versed in the intricacies of technical settings of email marketing automation to maximise the impact of your email campaigns, strengthen connections with your audience, and ultimately achieve greater success in your email marketing efforts.

Reach out today so we can Create to Generate together.