Are you a business owner looking to achieve hyper-sales growth through outbound sales?

Well, you are in the right place. But here in this article, we are going to the fundamentals even before you start the cold email outreach. It's how you set up the email infrastructure for your cold email campaigns.

If you don't set it right, you might be trying to send cold emails to prospects and wondering why you're not getting replies. It's no wonder, there are high chance it is going to spam directly.

So there are many components to consider while you set up cold email campaigns, including buying secondary domains, configuring inboxes, setting up custom tracking, etc. Everything you need to know to set up your cold emails to land in your inbox will be covered in this comprehensive article.

Why is deliverability important for any email outreach?

The primary objective of email deliverability is to guarantee that the emails you craft reach the desired inboxes of your intended recipients. It analyzes the portion of your subscriber base receiving your emails, providing insight into their successful delivery. Essentially, it serves as a pivotal method for gauging the efficacy of your email initiatives. If your email recipients aren't engaging, it could suggest issues with either your content or subscriber list. Consequently, monitoring email deliverability offers valuable insights into the overall performance of your email strategy.

What is the difference between Email Delivery & Email Deliverability?

What are the key factors affecting Email Deliverability?

Content quality: Relevant and engaging content reduces the likelihood of emails being marked as spam.

Sender reputation: A positive sender reputation improves deliverability; a negative reputation can lead to email filtering.

Email Authentication: Proper authentication protocols such as SPF, DKIM, and DMARC increase reliability and deliverability.

List Hygiene: Regular cleaning of your email list prevents sending to inactive or invalid addresses and reduces bounce rates.

Engagement metrics: Low open and click rates indicate poor engagement, which can affect delivery.

ISP filtering: Different ISPs may have their own filtering systems that affect email delivery. Deliverability Monitoring: Regular monitoring of email deliverability metrics helps identify and resolve issues quickly.

Spam complaints: High spam complaints indicate low-quality content or unsolicited emails that affect deliverability.

Email volume and frequency: Sending too many emails too often can trigger spam filters that can affect deliverability.

Mobile optimization: Emails that are not optimized for mobile recipients. may be marked as spam.

How do you check your email deliverability score?

• Use email deliverability testing tools like MailTester or GlockApps.

• Send test emails to multiple email addresses, including popular email providers like Gmail, Yahoo, and Outlook.

• Monitor bounce rates, spam complaints, and inbox layout rates in your email marketing platform.

• Use email validation tools like SPF, DKIM, and DMARC to ensure proper authentication and improve deliverability. Analyze engagement metrics like open rates, click-through rates, and unsubscribe rates to measure recipient engagement.

• Regularly review ISP recommendations to identify and correct issues with your email campaigns.

• Work with your email provider or delivery experts for basic analysis and recommendations.

• Use best practices for list hygiene, content quality, and sender. reputation management to optimize deliverability.

• Stay abreast of industry trends and email standards updates to adjust your strategies accordingly.

• Constantly monitor and refine your email marketing practices based on deliverability data to maintain optimal performance.

20 Tips for Cold Email Deliverability:

1. Getting Multiple Secondary Domains and Inboxes

The most efficient and effective way to launch large cold email campaigns is to create and send emails from multiple domains and inboxes.

You can protect your domain reputation against spam complaints by using secondary domains and rotating mailboxes. This strategy ensures that if one email is compromised, the others remain intact, protecting your reputation.

Let's say you have a basic domain like “Salesloft.com”. This domain has an excellent reputation for search engine optimization (SEO), domain authority, and sender reputation. So any marketing messages you send from this domain are likely to perform well and reach your target audience successfully.

Imagine you are part of the sales team at SalesLoft. While your primary domain is great for formal communications, it may not be the best choice for cold emails. This is where satellite domains come into play. They are like additional versions of your main domain, created specifically for outbound sales.

It's a wise idea to utilize alternative domain names for cold emailing, such as "trySalesloft.com," "goSalesloft.com," or "getSalesloft.com." The best part is that having numerous email accounts for each domain is much better. For instance, under the "GetSaleslofts.com" domain, you may have two different inboxes: "jay@GetSalesloft.com" and "sunny@GetSalesloft.com".
Even if one of the inboxes on that domain is marked as spam, emails from the other inboxes on that domain will still be sent.

It's similar to having email backup plans! Your cold emailing campaign might succeed much more if you use this smart tactic.

It's like multiple layers of protection that ensure your emails always have the best chance of reaching your audience's inbox.

2. Buying Cold Email Domains from High-Quality Sources

Think of your email domain as a reputation score. Just like you'd trust a recommendation from a reputable friend more than one from a stranger, email providers trust domains with a good reputation more than those with a bad one. So, when you're buying domains for your cold emails, make sure to get them from trusted sources with a clean history. It's like choosing a trustworthy friend to vouch for you.

For example, Purchase domains from reliable domain registrars like GoDaddy, Namecheap, or Only buy.com rather than from random online dealers. You are less likely to purchase a domain with a negative reputation from these companies because they have a history of delivering trustworthy domain services.

Another option is to search for names with a clean reputation but a prior owner. ExpiredDomains.net and similar websites let you look for expired domains to buy and use for your cold email campaigns. Just remember to do your homework and look out for the domain's reputation before purchasing.

Set up inboxes for these new domains in Google or Outlook. You may also prefer to use Cloudflare at this point to manage your domain and DNS settings.

3. Setting Up the Right Number of Inboxes

Think of juggling too many balls at once. It's overwhelming, right? The same goes for inboxes. You need to have just the right number so you can keep track of all your emails without feeling swamped. Let’s do a quick math:

Based on your TAM you decided to send 2000 emails a month.

So that is on weekly = 2000/4 = 500 emails weekly.

So that is daily = 500/5 = 100 emails daily.

Through one inbox you can set it up to send 50 emails/day (without warmup). so you need the below:

Setup 1 new domain

Set up 2 inboxes for this domain - 2*50 (limit per day) = 100 emails per day to reach 2000 emails a month.

Imagine sending 10,000 emails a month. Then you need

Use this Domain, inbox, and lead calculator for your needs - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1rwtJM0MePBpbYH7IG6QYfOQ5uu_B-Gj1bz3oWtqkzVc/edit?usp=sharing

Having multiple inboxes could be beneficial when your business expands and you receive more emails, as it will keep you better organised. To streamline your email management process, you can maintain several inboxes for general, sales, and customer service queries.

4. Setting Up MX, DKIM, SPF, and DMARC Records

MX, DKIM, SPF, and DMARC authentications might sound very technical, but they’re critical for cold emailing and easy to set up: they tell email service providers that you're a valid sender from your domain.

If you google “how to set up an SPF record for Google Workspace”, you will get details with step-by-step instructions on how to set up each record.

If you buy your domain and inboxes from the same provider, they will set up the MX, DKIM, and SPF for you—all you have to do is set up a DMARC record and policy. (This applies to you if you have a Google domain with Google Workspace inboxes, for example)

MX Record

• An MX record indicates which mail server should handle emails for a domain, acting as instructions for emails. They can prioritise more than one server and contain the domain name of the server.

DKIM record

• DKIM, or ‘DomainKeys Identified Mail’, checks the reliability of emails. It uses unique codes to connect a domain name to an email. Receivers can verify that the emails are authorised by examining these” cryptographic” codes.

SPF record

• SPF, or Sender Policy Framework compares the IP address of the email server with the domain's records to validate it. This ensures that emails are sent from the correct address.

DMARC record

• DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance) joins features of DKIM and SPF to revamp email authentication. A DMARC record includes details about a domain's DKIM and SPF settings, describes what to do with emails that aren't compliant and offers reporting options.

5. Setting Up a Custom Tracking Domain

Watch the number of individuals who read your emails when you launch a cold email campaign to make sure they don't end up in the spam folder. Your emails are most likely going into the main inbox if more than 35% of recipients are opening them.

Note: Open rate is not an indicator of your campaign performance but a metric to see if your emails are landing in the prospect’s inbox and not in spam.

To track who's opening your emails, special pixels are put in them that send a signal when the email is opened. Using your special tracking domain is better than using a public one because sometimes the public ones get mixed up with spam emails for example if you don't use any custom domain tracking and use a platform like Instantly, they have its tracking domain which people might be marking them as spam and it leads to an impact in your email deliverability

Some email platforms, like Instantly and Smartlead, have guides on how to set up your tracking domain. Be careful though, because sometimes the number of opens can be wrong. If it seems like someone is opening your email many times, it might not be accurate. And remember, once your emails are doing well, you might want to turn off the tracking to avoid being seen as spam.

6. Email Warm-up

Inbox warming means slowly sending more cold emails from a new domain to make it trusted before sending lots.

It's important because if you send too many cold emails from a new domain too fast, it looks suspicious. Spam filters might block your emails from reaching people's inboxes.

Use tools like SmartLead, Instantly, or Lemwarm to warm up your inboxes. They send a few emails each day from your new domain to build trust. Start with a few emails and gradually increase, but don't start with too many.

Warm up your inboxes for 3 weeks for better results. Start with 3-5 emails on the first day, then increase slowly. Aim for a 25-35% response rate on your warmup emails, but not 100% because your response rate will drop when you start your main campaign.

7. Setting Up Domain Forwarding

Forwarding is super helpful when you're sending cold emails. It means if someone checks where your email comes from when you use new domains like ‘getsalesloft.com’, they'll end up on your main website. This makes you seem more trustworthy. Also, if you set up permanent 301 forwarding, it connects your other domains to your main one, which can make your emails get delivered better.

To set up forwarding, go to your domain's control panel. In GoDaddy, find the Forwarding menu and type your main domain in the "Forward to" or “Redirect to” box for each of your other domains.

8. Crafting Compelling Copywriting

Having a compelling, personalised, and relevant offer is the most important factor in cold email deliverability. You can land in people's inboxes even with a poorly configured technical domain if your offer is appealing and relevant. We've successfully sent cold emails from brand-new inboxes without any warmup, and we received a 72% open rate.

 The campaigns included 3 AI-generated personalized lines and a strong call to action.

The content of your cold email campaigns matters more than deliverability.

Craft your compelling offer starting from your subject lines and cold email copies with personalized lines.

Note: Relevance > Personalization - we will talk about this in the coming blogs

When sending cold emails, choose the name of the person in your company who is most popular on social media. If that's not an option, use the founder's name. If neither is possible, go for the name of the most senior marketing or salesperson. As a last choice, use a female name from your sales team or organization.

Also, talk about ‘mobile phone short’. Talk about using Twain as a platform to finetune the messaging easily.

For copywriting tips, follow Josh Braun and Jeff Molander for more information.

9. Personalize Subject Lines

Subject lines are like book titles. In the first few seconds of seeing it, it must grab people's attention and motivate them to read further.

Personalize it to the recipient if you can, and keep it short and eye-catching. Nail your subject lines first. Make it more relevant.

Here are simple templates for inspiration.

[first name], reg Fintech conf

[first name], your podcast

These examples demonstrate that you took the effort to learn something about the receiver, making the email feel more like someone curious to know than a sales pitch. Remember to make it short, brief, authentic, and relevant if you want those open!

Of course, these are just attention factors but as we said earlier, your offer has to be solid.

10. Using Spintax

Spintax is a method for creating many copies of the same content in a cold email. Special symbols (e.g., {} and |) indicate many alternatives for words or sentences.

For instance, you may compose a subject line like this:
"{Hurry up|Act fast|Don't hold back} to grab your {freebie|gift|surprise} with your next order!" It suggests three potential topic lines to email someone.

There are many ways to create different versions of a cold email or its subject lines with similar meanings. For example, you can change how you greet the person, use tools like Google Docs or Grammarly to find synonyms or vary the inspirational quotes in your email signature. Tools like sp1in.me can help you set these up quickly.

11. Starting Slowly with Cold Emails

Sending a lot of cold emails at once is the same as attempting to shout loudly in a crowded room. The message you want to convey could be lost in the crowd. Instead, start with a few emails to observe how things go. Once you've got the hang of it, you may send more slowly.

Before you launch a large email campaign, you should warm up your email accounts. Send no more than 10 cold emails every day from your warm-up accounts for the greatest results. If you don't have enough time to adequately warm up your accounts, send 10 to 15 cold emails every day and try to keep the same sending frequency for each account.

12. Avoiding Spam Trigger Words

Imagine trying to have a conversation with someone who only speaks in buzzwords and jargon. It's annoying, right? The same goes for spam trigger words in emails.

To ensure that your emails reach people's inboxes, avoid employing terms that may trigger spam alarms. Instead, choose neutral language that doesn't seem highly promotional. In this manner, your emails will feel more authentic and keep people interested without being marked as spam.

Avoid using words like "discount" or "urgent" that might set off alarm bells for spam filters.

Refer to this list of spam words list https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1DjqI4jTvm7A068TYIK68XiMF8Z3oHlYOkwyMydP-uuI/edit?usp=sharing

13. Avoiding Images, Links, or Attachments

Sending emails with photographs, links, or attachments is similar to attempting to deliver someone a flier amid a busy street. They are just going to ignore it or, worse, toss it away. Keep your emails concise and focused on the topic you want to express.

While links are viewed as spam indicators and increase the likelihood that your email will be reported or rejected, embedded images might be blocked by email clients and negatively impact the deliverability of cold emails.

14. Include an opt-out or unsubscribe link

Respect your recipient's wishes by giving them the option to opt out of future emails. It's like giving them an escape hatch if they're not interested in what you have to say. Always go for opt-outs over unsubscribe links since they're more user-friendly.

In certain places like California, it's necessary to include a way for recipients to opt out of receiving cold emails, usually through an "unsubscribe" link. However, using these links might decrease the chances of your emails being delivered because:

a) They contain clickable links,

b) They could be seen as more likely to be spam or promotional, and

c) They often signal to recipients that the emails are part of an automated sequence.

Thus, instead of including unsubscribe buttons, we would rather include choices such as "Tell us if you're no longer interested" or "Let us know if you want to stop receiving these emails." As a result, receivers may opt out without having to click a link.

The other day, I saw this nice copy for an unsubscribe message:

15. Sending Only to Valid Email Addresses

Make sure the emails you send are going to real email addresses. If you send emails to addresses that don't work, it can make it harder for your emails to get through and make your email reputation look bad. Before sending out emails, double-check your list and remove any bad email addresses.

Some tools can help with this. ZeroBounce is good but costs a lot. Other tools like Debounce are cheaper and work well too. If you already have a list of emails, you can clean them up by getting a lifetime deal on an email verifier platform by using marketplace apps like Appsumo.

When checking email lists, catch-all domains can't confirm if an email address is real or fake, so it's hard to be sure the list is good and your campaign will work. But there are ways to deal with this, like using Google Sheets to check if email addresses are connected to real Google accounts.

16. Using Spam Checkers

Spam checkers are like having a second pair of eyes to look over your emails and make sure everything is okay. They'll flag any potential issues so you can fix them before hitting send.

You can use tools like GMass Spam Checker (it's free!), Glock Apps, or Mail Tester (https://www.mail-tester.com/) to see if your emails are going to the spam folder instead of the inbox. These tools do seed list tests, which means they send test emails to a small group of special inboxes and see where they end up.

17. Using MX Matching

MX matching is a new idea for cold emailing. It's important to send emails from the same place as the person you're sending to. For example, if you use Gmail, only email other Gmail users. The big email services like Gmail and Outlook keep an eye on who sends emails using their systems. If Gmail gets an email from Outlook, it might wonder, "Can I trust this?" Sometimes, to be safe, they might block emails from different email platforms.

Tools like Smartlead can match your email provider with the ones the prospect uses and send emails for higher deliverability. https://helpcenter.smartlead.ai/en/articles/72-understanding-esp-matching-in-smartlead

18. Turning off Bad Campaigns ASAP

Turn off a bad cold email campaign as soon as you become aware of it. You'll recognize what's "bad" when you encounter it—watch out for angry responses or many people asking to be removed from your list.

Don't put your domain's reputation in danger by trying to revive an unsuccessful campaign. Reassess your content, product positioning, and email strategy immediately. By doing this, you will raise the probability that your next cold email campaign will be successful and avoid receiving more spam reports or unsubscriptions.

19. Monitoring Blacklist Activity

If you notice that your cold email open rate or reply rate is dropping, check if your email address or domain is on any blacklists. These blacklists, such as Spamhaus or Barracuda Central, label senders as spammers, causing their emails to be filtered out automatically. Sometimes, you may need to pay to be removed from a blacklist, but other times, a simple inquiry can do the trick.

Tools such as MXToolbox, Glock apps, or Gmass can assist you in verifying whether your IP address or domain is listed on any blacklists and provide instructions on how to request removal. (Being on the SORBS blacklist isn't usually a big concern, as many domains are listed on it.)

20. Adhering to Sending Limits

Do not try to send more emails from one inbox. you can always get another new domain and set up inboxes if you want to scale the outreach numbers.

You can configure one inbox to deliver around 25-40 emails in a day to safeguard reputation and prevent domain burnout.

Becoming a cold emailing pro requires mastering several key elements: technical know-how, smart planning, and authentic communication. Stick to these principles and use the tips provided to ace your cold emailing game. With the right approach, your messages will hit the mark and bring you the results you're after.