In this post we will delve into a topic that can be confusing upon first glance, but ultimately can have a significant impact upon the reach and overall success of your email campaigns. By the end of this 10-minute read we hope that you will understand what sending domains are and the difference between a dedicated server or a shared server for your brand.
What are sending domains?
Sending domains are essentially the address of the warehouse from which your emails are sent, in a digital sense. A domain appears in the sender details found at the top of an email when it is delivered into an inbox, and this indicates the source of the email. In some instances it is shown as “sent on behalf of '' or “via klaviyomail.com” in the case of Klaviyo’s default setting. See below as an example of how these two aspects of an email appear in an inbox, where red denotes the sender and blue indicates the sending domain, green of course is the actual email address.
Dedicated vs Shared Domains
There is a subtle but significant difference between dedicated and shared sending domains. As a rule of thumb, most email sending platforms start new accounts out on a domain shared by a number of other accounts/senders. This means all accounts on the shared domain impact the reputation of the whole shared domain's deliverability.
On the flip side, a dedicated server is unique to a single account and therefore has a single reputation, only impacted by an account's own actions. A dedicated sending domain affords full control over your email ecosystem, from using your own brand’s domain name to sender reputation. That means you can build your reputation without worrying about the potential negative impact from shared senders.
It's important to know for dedicated domains that if you have a brand new domain or are just beginning the foray into email marketing, you need to build up your reputation through a warm-up period.
Best Practices for “Warming Up” Domains
Warm-up periods allow accounts to slowly introduce their sending domain to the world through messaging sent only to the most engaged users. This approach safeguards against bounces, unsubscribes and the like that would otherwise damage your overall rating. Best practices suggest warming up domains by sending to only engaged users for around a month or longer. The goal is to be conservative and intentional with your sending cadence while warming up an account.
The Warm-up Timeline
For your first two weeks, isolate your sending to a segment consisting of 30-days engaged users. A 30-day engaged segment is essentially users who have opened or clicked one or more emails that you have sent them previously, so it’s safe to assume they are actively engaged with your messaging. The goal of these first two weeks is to maintain open rates of 20% or higher. If results stay consistent, you can then ease back the throttle on engagement levels to a 60-day engaged segment for the second two weeks.
Finally, after a month of messaging and a 20% overall open rate, you can enter the last phase which is to expand to a 90-day engagement segment. After one to two weeks you should be able to begin sending to your entire list. If at any stage the open rates drop below 20%, it’s a good idea to revert back to the previous stage in order to maintain the 20% open rate benchmark. Being vigilant of your open rates and click rates is still key to ongoing email sending health. That is why we always suggest using a list-pruning method such as a sunset series. For more on list pruning, check out back in autumn for our post on the topic.
How to set up a dedicated sending domain
A key component of setting up a dedicated sending domain is the communication between your domain and the email sending platform. Generating records, a process in which a user adds information to their hosting domain platform to update their domain name system settings (DNS), requires access to your domain hosting and the set-up varies based on the email sending platform that you are using. Below are instructions from some of the top ESPs on the market on setting up a sending domain.
The Verdict
Both options of sending domains used to be viable strategies for your brand. However, due to Google, Yahoo, and now Microsoft's new sender requirements, sender email address must align with the branded sending domain.
We recommend setting up a dedicated sending domain for your brand and following the how-to guides and warm-up schedule outlined above to create an optimized sender reputation and deliverability metrics.
At Foghorn Labs we have experience setting these up for our clients and aiding clients as they set up domains on their end.
Reach out if you're are interested in having Foghorn become a part of
your email and SMS marketing strategy
Share:
Understanding Email, SMS and Form Data
The Many Ways to Automate Email and SMS