1. Deliverability Alert: Your Whois Should Be Made Public

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    If the Whois of your domain name is set to private/anonymous, you should act as soon as possible: you need to make it public. Otherwise, your deliverability may suffer drastically, if it isn’t already the case…

    What is a private Whois?

    Certain domain registrars propose to anonymize your Whois by making it “private.” This allows you to hide information about the entity or person holding a particular domain name. 

    By default, a Whois always gives information about the owner: the name of the person or organization who holds the domain, address, etc.

    Example: with the Whois, you can know that “mailjet.com” is held by “Mailjet SAS, 30 rue Blondel, 75010 Paris, etc.”

    Deliverability issues because of private Whois

    Our deliverability team noticed that domains with private/anonymous Whois information are more susceptible to suffer blocking and/or blacklisting. European and French ISPs are particularly affected. 

    Make your Whois public as soon as possible

    If your Whois is in private/anonymous mode, we encourage you to make it public ASAP.  If you are not yet affected, you will be soon. Note that ISPs can take up to 7 days to  take changes into account. It is thus necessary to act as quickly as possible.

  2. Need To Explain Mailjet To Your Friends?

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    I’ve just finished a nice presentation explaining briefly what we do and where our added-value is. Check it out! It is quite interesting :-) 

  3. Interview of Julien Tartarin, Our CTO / Founder On doeswhat.com

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    How would you describe Mailjet in under 50 words?

    Mailjet is a Cloud-Based service. We send, track and deliver emails. Our service is easy to use and easy to integrate via SMTP or with our API. We focus On real time and deliverability. We’re an all in one solution: Mailjet sends all your emails: bulk and transactional.

    What made you decide to start working on Mailjet?

    Sending email has always been easy, but during these last years, delivering it to the inbox has become very complicated. I’ve realized this in my previous jobs where I needed to configure and optimize email servers. 

    According to Return Path, more than 25% of legitimate email doesn’t reach the inbox. This can be disastrous (think about apps, online retailers, etc.).

    For developers, making sure that email is getting delivered represents a huge amount of work. But they often need to focus on their product rather than on email delivery… 

    Read the whole interview on Doeswhat. 

  4. Why you should keep your spam rate below 0.1%

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    Our terms of use are strict, but our recommendations are even tougher! :) One of the things that we ask you (among others) is to keep your spam rate below 0.1%. OK, this can seem exaggerated. You might even be thinking: “hey, that’s nothing, nada, merely a tenth of a percent.” OK, but in reality, it’s much more than that! Let’s see why.

    The effect of complaints on the IP reputation

    Any email must transit through an IP address. This latter has a certain reputation which is rated between 0 and 100. If spam is sent through an IP, the rating drops and the messages and no longer placed in the inbox. First they start hitting in the “spam folder” and then it gets worse: they simply disappear in the internet void!

    The impact of spam on the IP reputation

    We’ve already underlined this in our last post Key Facts on Deliverability, the complaint rates directly impact your IP reputation. With a 0.1% spam rate, reputation drops and starts costing a lot!

    The effect of a reputation drop on your deliverability

    As we love to say: deliverability is not an indicator, it’s an objective. Among the most interesting deliverability metrics, you have the Inbox Placement Rate (IPR).

    Hereafter, please consider the effect that a drop in IP reputation has on the IPR:

    What it means: a 2% spam rate = 50% of lost email 

    If 2% of the recipients click on the “report as spam” button, you can be sure that a good half of your emails will never be received. And this is the best-case scenario! A blacklisting could also occur and then… All the emails transiting through the concerned IP will get blocked!

    What can you do about this?

    The marketing teams often underestimate the fact that the recipients click on the “report as spam” button, even if the email is legitimate. Recipients might even do this just because it’s simpler than unsubscribing. It is therefore very important to ensure that the unsubscribe link is clearly visible! In other words: monitor the quality of the list!

    The other optimization axis is of course the content: avoid being too aggressive or intrusive. Offer great content!

    As you can see on the screenshots, these graphs come from our partner, Return Path.

  5. Key Facts On Email Deliverability You Want To Know

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    Last week, I attended a Return Path Webinar: “Help! My Email is Getting Marked as Junk”. For your information, Return Path is a partner from Mailjet, especially for what concerns the IP reputation monitoring. 20% of legitimate Email never reaches the inbox: it’s becoming a well known fact, so you might already know this. But here are a couple of interesting deliverability stats you should know.

    The Growth of Spam in the last 20 years

    The fact that 90% of email is considered as spam is often ignored. Note also how the Legitimate Email share evolves… In fact this is how Mailjet was born: because of the huge spam augmentation these last years, the way we send email has completely changed. It has become a full time job…

    Key figures to illustrate the effects of deliverability on ROI

    It’s pure common sense but we really love this slide: it makes its point. Low deliverability means lower revenues!

    How to improve deliverability

    This slide actually is a good sum up of the advices we’re giving :)

    The relation between the spam complaints and the IP reputation

    This chart is great as it illustrates the effect of the “report as spam” button on your IP reputation. When you look at it, I guess you understand why Mailjet is so demanding when it comes to your metrics :) An IP address with a low reputation will often end up with a low deliverability… 

    Overalll, this webinar was very interesting. Return Path always has a pedagogical approach. Their approach often explores the issues from different point of views: email marketers, ISPs, ESPs, etc. It allows you to get the big picture: that’s quite useful! In fact, anyone involved in email sending should check Return Path’s ressources from time to time.

  6. The 5 Things Mailjet Does For Your Deliverability

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    More than 20% of legitimate emails don’t make it to the inbox. In order to deliver your emails properly, a lot of technical constraints must be respected. Mailjet is an all-in-one solution that allows the user to simplify the complexity of a successful sending. But what does Mailjet actually do? Let’s see this in 5 key points.

    I- Management and monitoring of the reputation

    Mailjet allows you to watch and protect the global reputation you have as a sender. This is defined by the reputation of the URLs, the domains and the IP addresses that are used. The content of the messages can impact each of these elements.

    A lot of indicators are put at your disposal. From your Mailjet Dashboard, you will have access to the reputation of your IPs and to the scoring Spamassassin, which allows to validate the major formats and filters.

    II- Access to authentication tools : SPF, DKIM & Domain Keys

    Some authentication systems have become some standards for most of the ISPs. The objective of these systems is to guarantee and protect the identity of the senders. This is part of the fight against phishing for example. Therefore, it is often necessary to publish these certificates. If you don’t do this, the ISPs can consider the non-authenticated emails as suspect and place them in the spam folder.

    The SPF, DKIM & Domain Keys are the important standards. This is why Mailjet provides you these authentications by default. However, you can personalize them for free. If needed, our support team will assist you in this process.

    III- Optimization of the sending pace (throttling)

    Some recipients may impose some temporary or permanent volume restrictions. To guarantee an optimization of the general reputation, Mailjet can slow down and adapt the sending pace when needed. By respecting this imposed variations, the messages are accepted, they don’t bounce and can get to the inboxes. 

    IV- Optimization of the HTML structure of the email

    An incorrectly coded email can trigger some anti-spam filters. Thanks to its Newsletter Tool, Mailjet gives to anyone the ability to get 100% optimized code: from the header to the body of the email, all the HTML elements will abide by the rules that guarantee an improved deliverability. Note that when using this feature, no technical knowledge is required.

    V- Statistics, Feedback Loops and the relationship with the ISPs

    Mailjet’s strength also resides in the richness of the sending follow-up. Every complaint is traced and taken into account, thanks to the feedback loops. For example, when someone clicks on the button “report as spam”, Mailjet gets this information and stops sending to this email address. The bounces and unsubscriptions are also automatically managed.
    This helps to maintain high quality lists, anyone persisting in sending undesired emails could get blacklisted at any moment. Even if the complaints come only from 1% of the recipients, this would be enough to get blocked by the major ISPs. In general, Mailjet works closely with ISPs and respects all the latest standards and recommendations.

    As a conclusion

    Mailjet addresses all the technical questions related to the deliverability of the emails. From there, the email sender just has to observe the basic best practices: opt-in lists, relevance of the messages improvement, sending frequencies, etc. For the rest, he can rely on Mailjet :)

  7. Get your personalized DKIM & SPF for free!

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    The email validation system SPF and the authentication method DKIM are key factors for optimizing your deliverability. This you may already know. But you might not be aware that it also very important to personalize these elements.

    Quick reminder: what are SPF & DKIM made for?

    The SPF and DKIM are used to authenticate the sender. They are used by the ISPs or webmail providers (Yahoo, Gmail, etc.) to find out whether or not an email should be delivered to the inbox of a recipient.

    By default, most of the Email Service Providers insert some SPF and DKIM in the emails they route for their clients. Thanks to this system, the ISPs and Webmails are able to say: “OK, this email is legit, it’s not a phishing attempt”.

    Personalized SPF & DKIM for free

    Mailjet also inserts SPF and DKIM by default. But compared to its competitors, there is a big difference. We actually offer a personalization feature to anyone using our service.

    Any Mailjet account can benefit from this functionality, even if it’s on a Free Plan. We have a good reason to do this: it’s something important!

    Without personalized SPF & DKIM, it gets tougher

    Last july, we published a blog post about it: Gmail was deploying an update for its anti-phishing system. We wanted to draw your attention on the “via” mention that could appear for the people who were not using personalized SPF and DKIM. As an illustration, this is the result:


    It’s simple: the webmail accepts the email because it can authenticate it. But at the same time, it chooses to inform the recipient that the SPF and DKIM do not match with the actual sender (= the sender address).

    With Mailjet, you don’t have to pay any extra to get rid of this “via” mention. We provide you a personalized signature and norm of authentication. You just have to add them in your DNS record.

    See the difference?

    Globally speaking and to avoid to draw unnecessary scrutiny, personalization of the authentication system  is very important. It is also very good for your deliverability.

    If you already have a Mailjet account and that you can benefit from this feature, just log in and visit our Wizard. Otherwise, create a free account :)

  8. [White Paper] Email Marketing For Online Retailers: now available for download!

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    The version in english is finally out! 28 pages to get it all: basic notions, tips & case studies.

    Like almost 90% of advertisers, you are using the email channel because it is the most profitable one. However, the power of this tool often masks the fact that with a few simple optimizations, the positive effects of a campaign can be even greater.

    Have you already heard about “SPF”, “A/B testing” or “triggered emails” but everything isn’t crystal clear yet? Then this White Paper is perfect for you!

    This document will explain to you the A to Z of how to maximize the effect of your campaign. It goes through all the basic notions that one should master in order to optimize business email productivity.

    Just click on the following link to download our White Paper: Email Marketing for Online Retailers

    Don’t hesitate to share it on Twitter!

    In this 28 pages document, you will find:

    - An explanation of the basic notions and of today’s emailing context;
    - Simple advices to boost your ROI;
    - Practical cases to illustrate the theory and boost your imagination.

    Enjoy the White Paper!

  9. Emails in Hotmail’s spam folder, the best way to avoid this!

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    As we have seen, emails getting in Hotmail’s spam folder is a very sensitive problem. If Microsoft itself gets caught in the spam filter, you might think that there is nothing to do about it. But “no perfect solution” doesn’t mean that nothing can be done. On the contrary: it means that you should pay close attention to what you are doing. This way, you will avoid problems, most of the time.

    STEP 1: Your general strategy: always prefer quality over quantity
      We’ll never say it enough: stop thinking “volumes”, start thinking “relevant”. Send less and send better: segment your database. Remove the inactive contacts or treat them separately, this is a must. The contents that you send should be as personalized as possible (topics, layout, time of sending, etc.).

      STEP 2: To do things right, use the right tool: a Cloud Emailing solution that focuses on deliverability

      Mailjet does that and if our growth is so strong, that’s because we take care of a real problem that is hard to address on your own. Our rates are very low and you pay as you go: we did this because we believe that the service we offer is part of the basics needs. A Cloud Emailing solution that optimizes the sending for deliverability is no longer a nice to have, it is a must.

      Think about what implies the maintaining and finetuning of an email server for throttling, feedback loops, IP reputation monitoring, etc. It’s a full time job that requires a whole team who has a lot of knowledge and experience, period.
        STEP 3: Never give up and always make sure you do the basics
        If you have the right long term strategy and the right tool, at the end you also need to pay attention to the small details: nobody will be able to do it for you :)

        Avoid spammy words (viagra, dollars, etc.), of course. Don’t go for heavy emails of several megabytes. Make sure that your SPF and DKIM authentications are well configured. If you’re on dedicated IP, make sure that your sending is regular. 

        As a conclusion

        You got it: no miracle solution! So you might think: “ouch! that’s a lot of work!” and it’s true. But improved deliverability doesn’t happen like this: it will improve a lot your revenues but it will also necessitate a few efforts. These efforts would be overwhelming if you were on your own but if Mailjet is your emailing partner, it becomes much more easy for you :)