Warming up a dedicated domain is an essential process to build a positive sender reputation and ensure deliverability for your emails or other online activities. When warming up a dedicated domain, you need to monitor several key factors to ensure a successful transition.
Should you have a question regarding any KPI during the warmup process, be sure to open a Cendyn Support Ticket - add a special note to FLAG ticket to EMAIL DELIVERABILITY Team.
Link to open Ticket: Submit a request – Cendyn
Here are the most important areas you should be actively monitoring:
Email Volume
Start with sending a low volume of emails and gradually increase it over time. Monitor the number of emails you're sending daily to ensure you stay within the recommended limits. Cendyn will assist in designing your warmup campaign schedule. Post warmup, having a consistent send volume per dedicated domain will be absolutely critical to your email campaign success. As a general rule, it is never good to spike volume 2X more than the average campaign send volume.
Engagement Metrics
Keep track of email open rates, click-through rates, and other engagement metrics (Spam/Abuse Complaints and Opt-Outs/Unsubscribes). ISPs (internet service providers) use these metrics to evaluate your sender reputation. Positive engagement signals will help improve your reputation.
- Unique Open Rates should be > 30%.
- Click-Through Rates lower than 0.8% is considered to be a low engagement. During a warm-up, sending to the most engaged subscribers is critical.
- Unsubscribe Rates should be within the health range of less than or equal to 0.3%.
- Spam complain rate should be below 0.2%.
Bounce Rates
Monitor bounce rates at the campaign level, and ensure they stay within acceptable limits. High bounce rates can harm your sender reputation. Bounce rates should be less than 2%; however, it is critical to review the bounce details to ensure that the IP/Domain is not being impacted by any reputation issues. When reviewing the bounce details, look for reputation key words, such as: reputation, blocklist, blacklist, IP blocked, throttled/throttling, rate limit, etc.
Spam Complaint Rates (Spam Reports)
Keep an eye on the number of recipients marking your emails as spam. Spam Complaint Rates are determined by subscribers who click “this is spam” or “mark as junk” buttons in emails they no longer wish to receive.
Subscribers often use this approach interchangeably with unsubscribing to stop receiving emails. But there’s a key difference: High spam complaint rates have negative implications on sender reputation and deliverability — unsubscribes don’t.
Maintaining low complaint rates is crucial for a good sender reputation. Review the Campaign's Abuse Complaint Rate via the Cendyn CRM's Campaign Manager and/or Cendyn CRM Campaign Reports. Any Abuse Complaint rate equal to or greater than 0.2% can result in reputation-related bounces that will require remediation. These need to be spotted quickly to avoid negatively impacting the warmup plan.
You should monitor your Google Spam Complaint Rate via Google Postmaster, Google's free online feedback tool. Google's Complaints won't be visible in the Cendyn CRM.
ISP Filtering
Check if your emails are landing in the inbox, spam folder, or being blocked altogether. Monitor this carefully and make adjustments if needed. The best mechanism to monitor inbox placement is to send your emails to legitimate test inboxes you've set up on ISPs such as Google, Yahoo, Hotmail, etc.
Domain Blocklisting
Regularly check if your domain address is blocklisted on popular email blocklists. Being blocklisted can severely impact your deliverability. It is not common to have a domain blocklisted during a warmup, as the domain is just starting to be used. However, monitor your campaign bounces from the Cendyn CRM Campaign Manager and dig into your failed deliveries using the Campaign Report for Hard and Soft Bounces. The bounce report offers your detailed information as to why emails failed to be delivered.
Timing
Pay attention to the time of day and day of the week when you send emails. Different times may have varying impacts on deliverability and engagement. During the warmup, you can vary your time of day send and evaluate campaign performance from the Cendyn CRM Campaign Manager > Campaigns Screen.
Content
Ensure that your emails' content is relevant, well-formatted, and does not trigger spam filters. Content plays a critical role in campaign engagement, and as the hotel warms-up the Dedicated IP, ISPs are looking for great engagement from each subscriber. The hotel has the opportunity to set a great first impression and mitigate any reputation issues that might impede campaign revenue generation.
Email Authentication
Set up SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records to authenticate your emails and add an extra layer of security. During the implementation process, the Cendyn CRM team will guide the hotel in the activation and domain setup in Cendyn CRM. With the recent announcement (October 2023) from Google and Yahoo!, email authentication is ever more critical to the success of your email program.
Tailor the Process to your Business Needs
The warmup is not a one-size-fits-all process. The specifics may vary based on your sending volume, your database size and content. It's crucial to approach the warming process cautiously to build a strong and positive sender reputation.
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