The score value ranges from 0 (bad) to 10 (excellent). The higher your score is, the less chance you have to get noticed by spam filters. However, please note that the Mail Tester score is not a guarantee of inbox or spam delivery.
You can manually check your email deliverability score using the mentioned service or ask our support team to help you.
Checking email deliverability score manually
If you choose to manually check your email deliverability score, go to the Mail Tester service and run their simple two-step procedure. When you get the result from Mail Tester, expand each section (+) to see the more detailed explanations.
Critical warnings and how to solve them
Below we will take a closer look at the most important warnings and give recommendations on how to deal with them.
Section: SpamAssassin does not like you
SpamAssassin is an anti-spam platform that provides a filter to classify emails and block spam. This filter includes a list of rules against which your message is checked.
In Mailtoaster, emails sent from sequences contain both HTML and plain text as well as all necessary tags. In general, HTML warnings can be ignored since you are sending emails from a third-party app (mailtoaster.ai).
Section: You're not fully authenticated
This section contains a report on domain configuration. If you send emails from your domain, you need to make sure all necessary settings are configured correctly: SPF, DKIM, DMARC, rDNS, MX records, A record. Missing or incorrectly configured parameters lead to email deliverability issues.
The above settings are domain settings, which means that:
To edit any of these records, you will need access to your hosting website.
Сhanging any of these records will affect every email address in your domain.
SPF record warning
SPF is a TXT record in your DNS that identifies the mail servers that are allowed to send emails on behalf of your domain. SPF is located in DNS records on your hosting website.
Mail Tester will help you to determine if you set it properly and will point to the root of the problem if a misconfiguration is found.
Note: Your mail provider is a required part of your SPF. If your mail provider is not listed in the SPF, then the mail provider is not authenticated.
How to set SPF record (if you don't have one)
The SPF record can be edited here:
Your hosting website -> your account -> DNS manager for domain
Most common settings for the SPF record:
Type: TXT
Hostname: @
TXT value: v=spf1 [mail provider value] ~all (other options: -all/?all)
For instance, the SPF record for GSuite users is:
v=spf1 include:_spf.google.com ~all
The SPF record for Office 365 users is:
v=spf1 include:spf.protection.outlook.com ~all
For other mail providers, visit their support section to check the SPF record you need to use.
Important:
You must not exceed 10 DNS lookups in your SPF. You can read more about this limit here.
If you need to add multiple parameters to your SPF record, you can validate your syntax here before deployment.
There should be only one SPF record per domain. Multiple SPF records can cause deliverability issues. All values should be added to one line.
For example, if you already have Mandrill SPF and need to authenticate GSuite, your future record should look like this:
v=spf1 include:spf.mandrillapp.com include:_spf.google.com ~all
Below you can find information on how to set SPF records for the most popular hosting websites:
Godaddy: Add an SPF record
Bluehost: How To Setup a DNS SPF
DKIM warning
DKIM is an email authentication method to verify if an email was actually sent and authorized by the owner of the domain.
DKIM is provided by your mail service, and it is not recommended to send emails without DKIM.
GSuite users can set DKIM using this guide.
Office 365 users can use the following MS guide.
For other mail providers, visit their support section or ask your provider's support team to assist you with DKIM.
DMARC warning
The DMARC policy allows senders to indicate that their emails are protected by SPF and/or DKIM, and to give instructions if none of these authentication methods pass. DMARC should be configured in DNS. Make sure you have DKIM and SPF set before configuring DMARC. We recommend following these instructions to generate a DMARC record or use the Mail Tester recommendations.
Section: Your message could be improved
In most cases, you will see the same result unless you have a List-Unsubscribe header, which would make this section perfect.
Section: You are listed in blacklists
Mail Tester also checks if your sending IP address is on the most common blacklists.
In case you find your IP address in any other blacklists, it is better to contact them directly and find out how to remove yourself from them.
Section: Broken links
If you have any broken links listed in this section, please double check your links in the sequence or contact us via Live Chat.
Mail Tester will error your links if they are formatted without HTTP/HTTPS. Make sure you format your links properly.
If you have any questions or need assistance, please contact our support team.