Emails Going to Spam Despite SPF, DKIM and DMARC Passing

A diagnostic order for mail that authenticates and still misses the inbox.

Symptom: a message shows SPF pass, DKIM pass, and DMARC pass, and the reader still finds it in spam. Diagnosis starts by believing the test. The domain is allowed to send. Something else is teaching the mailbox that the message is unwanted.

Test, cause, fix

Test the list. A high bounce rate means addresses that should never have been mailed. Fix: stop, verify, suppress the dead ones. Test complaints. A handful of 'this is spam' clicks on a small programme is a large share. Fix: stop the programme that drew them. Test sameness. Put five emails side by side. If the skeleton matches, the personalisation is decoration. Fix: one situation per send, or do not send.

Buying a new domain while the list and the template stay the same moves the symptom. Sendblox helps only after you change those inputs: a draft from a real field, approved, to a person who might answer.

Before you publish a change for emails going to spam, write down the date, the record you edited, and the one message you used as a test. A week later, check whether that test still matches production. Provider rules, DNS includes, and CRM fields all move. A page that was true in general can be wrong on your domain if nobody looked again. Keep the send small until that check is dull. One contact, one objective, a person reading the draft. If the test fails, stop the campaign. Do not widen it to see whether a larger list forgives a broken setup.

Before you publish a change for emails going to spam, write down the date, the record you edited, and the one message you used as a test. A week later, check whether that test still matches production. Provider rules, DNS includes, and CRM fields all move. A page that was true in general can be wrong on your domain if nobody looked again. Keep the send small until that check is dull. One contact, one objective, a person reading the draft. If the test fails, stop the campaign. Do not widen it to see whether a larger list forgives a broken setup.