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How to Avoid Sending Spam Emails in Magento

Moiz Khan May 24, 2017

Every website owners are very much concerned about the emails being received by their users in their spam folders. People on different community forums are this major problem of emails being marked as spam so I thought to write up on this and shed some light on this topic for correct configuration and to create a checklist.

Obviously, this is no website owner goals to drop their emails into the spam folder. Emails are supposed to be sent to the inbox rather than in the spam. So, today I am going to tell you how to avoid sending spam emails in Magento.

How the Spam Filter Works

First, let me describe you shortly as for how the spam filter works, not just for Magento emails but for every mail. Whenever any email received to your server, and the spam filter is enabled, it will check all the incoming messages for a list of parameters.

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The parameter can either affect final spam rating in the positive or negative way. Marking whether the email is a spam or not is based on final scores. Average and recommended score to mark any mail as spam is 6.6. If the score is low then it won’t be marked as spam but if the scores are higher then it will go to the spam folder. In this blog, we are going to discuss some most common reasons for the rise of spam score and will provide you some tips to reduce it. Keep in mind, the lower the score is, the more likely the email is going to be sent to the user’s inbox.

The Steps to Avoid Spam Mails in Magento

  •         Server & IP Configuration
  •         Email Structure
  •         Email Content
  •         Testing Email Messages

To decrease the possibility of the spam emails, be ensure the server is configured correctly and the DNS contains all the necessary records. The email message should contain required headers and MIME parts.

Server & IP Configuration for emails in Magento

  • SPF DNS Record

Configure the domain SPF record correctly. SPF record is basically a TXT record in the DNS which has a list of all the IPs and hostnames, authorized specifically to send emails from the domain.

HOW IT WORKS: When any receipt server gets any mail, it checks the IP address for the authorized address.

  • Domain Keys

The mail server attaches a signature to every outgoing mail. The signature is used to verify sender server by reading public key located in the DNS record of the system. There are basically three parts: a private server, not visible to anyone on the server, used to generate email signature. A public key, listed in the DNS TXT record, used to verify that the email was signed with a private key of a specific server. But this point doesn’t stop spammers from sending emails using Google servers or others. This is just an additional layer of security.

  • Reverse DNS

Whether sending email from a server inside the domain, ensures that it has its own IP address and the hostname is resolved to that IP address.MX Record

MX Record is necessary for your domain. It basically tells which email servers is responsible for handling all the incoming emails for the domain. It is required if in case the email couldn’t get delivered to the receipt address, so the receipt server can send an undelivered notification.

  • White IP Address

Sometimes IP address can become blacklisted. After getting a new IP address from the provider, it is suggested not to use it for at least a month. The reason behind it is the new IP address might also be used by someone else. This time delay will clear the IP address and becomes “white”.

  • SMTP

One of the good solution to use SMTP server to send emails in Magento. It can either be public or private mail sector. Some paid SMTP services are also available on the web. Magento does not work with SMTP, so one need an extension for it. But here is one drawback, there are only a few extensions available in the market which send emails using their own method and will not work through SMTP. Also, maintain the server to ensure it works correctly and is backed up often.

The first part is completed, the server is now configured and is all ready to send emails out. Let’s move towards the second step and look at the email messages structure.

Recommended E-Mail Structure in Magento

  • Plain Text Part

The biggest problem in Magento is it doesn’t send the text part. It only sends HTML message part, giving such messages a higher spam score. The text can either be entered manually or can be created automatically.

  • Embedded Images

     One can’t imagine an email without images. It is better to embed images directly into the message instead of linking them from remote resources.

Email Content Recommendation for Magento

  • Valuable Text

The text is important and useful for the readers. Bring value to it. Don’t do marketing for profit only. Don’t ever forget that your emails are read by humans.

  • No Image Emails – Do Html Coding

Avoid sending emails consisting a single image. It is no doubt hard to code email markup sometimes.Because single image emails are always considered as spam.

  • No Link Shorteners

Link shorteners can help you in building nice URLS because it is considered untrusted.  Your email will get up to 2 whole points for spam if any shortened link is found inside the email.

Testing Emails Messages in Magento

  • 3rd Party Service

Checking email in all apps is not possible to do manually. To get it done, you can use third-party services like litmus. It will generate previews of the messages on different platforms, web and desktop email clients. It is a very useful tool.

  • Use your Team

Once you are done with automatic testing, we would recommend you to send few copies to your circle, to get real life experience and feedbacks from live people.

  • Test Mobile View

Don’t ever forget to test the mobile view for Magento emails. Mobile marketing is continuously growing so the emails should look perfect on mobile devices too.

The End!!!

I hope this information comes handy to you. Got any more questions? Do comment below and I’ll be happy to help.

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