Ever hit “send” on the perfect email campaign only to hear… nothing? You’re not alone. Low open rates, missing responses, or emails landing in spam folders frustrate many senders. That’s where checking your email deliverability becomes crucial; it’s the key to making sure your emails actually reach your audience.
Email deliverability simply means the likelihood your messages land in someone’s inbox (not their spam or junk folder). If you’re asking, “How do I check my email deliverability?”—you’re already ahead. Catching deliverability issues early helps you reach more people and see better results from every email you send.
Here’s how you can easily run an email deliverability check and what you should look out for to improve your inbox placement rates:
Why Is Email Deliverability So Important?
If your emails consistently miss inboxes, you lose out on sales, engagement, and building trust. Even the best content won’t help if your messages never get seen! Running a regular email deliverability check saves you from wasted time and effort.
How to Check Email Deliverability (Step-by-Step)
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Authenticate Your Emails: Set up DKIM and DMARC records. Proper authentication shows email providers you’re a trusted sender and can instantly improve your deliverability email rates. Learn how to set these up by reviewing this guide on email authentication and deliverability
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Send Test Emails: Start by sending test emails to different email providers like Gmail, Outlook, and Yahoo. Check where your messages end up—inbox, promotions, or spam. This simple step gives immediate feedback.
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Use Email Deliverability Tools: There are online tools designed to analyze your email’s path, check for spam triggers, and give you a deliverability score. These tools review everything from your sending reputation to authentication setup.
Dmarcian offers tools for implementing strict authentication and monitoring potentially unauthorized uses of your domain by other senders.
Google Postmaster Tools gives insight into email performance on the largest free email provider, which generally gives a good impression of how your mail is received elsewhere.
Validity’s suite of email deliverability tools are more sophisticated and in-depth options for monitoring.
Everest is an all-in-one platform that pulls in everything from postmaster feedback look data, inbox placement, and overall sender reputation.
Litmus can also be used for designing emails to make sure content isn’t sacrificing sender reputation.
Top Ways to Improve Email Deliverability
- Clean Your Email List Regularly: Remove inactive subscribers and invalid email addresses. Sending to unengaged or outdated addresses hurts your reputation and deliverability.
- Avoid Spam Triggers: Stay away from excessive punctuation, certain keywords, and ALL CAPS in your subject line and body.
- Personalize and Segment: Tailored emails get more opens and make it less likely you’ll be marked as spam.
- Ask Subscribers to safelist you: Encourage your audience to add your email to their contact list, ensuring your messages reach their inbox.
Common Deliverability Email Issues to Watch For
- High bounce rates or lots of messages bouncing back
- Frequent spam complaints
- Sudden drop in open or click rates
If any of these happen after a deliverability check, prioritize list cleaning, re-engagement workflows, and review your sending schedule.
Continual monitoring is key. Run an email deliverability check every time you launch a major campaign or notice a dip in performance. Over time, you’ll notice more of your emails hitting inboxes, higher open rates, and better engagement. For more detailed tips, check out these expert email deliverability strategies to maximize your outreach.
Start putting these tips into action today and take charge of your email campaigns’ success. Have questions about a specific deliverability issue or curious about how to check your email deliverability in more detail? Share your experience or questions below, our community is here to help!