How Will the New Gmail and Yahoo! Anti-Spam Policies Affect Your Email Marketing (and What to Do about It)
You need to read this if you have an email list! Google and Yahoo! recently announced new rules for bulk email senders. They will come into effect in February 2024 and they will affect:
- Authentication
- Spam rate control
- Unsubscribe process — it needs to be easier!
- Enhanced inbox safety
The goal, as stated by Google and Yahoo!, is to offer a better email experience and to help their users get more emails they want to read and fewer unsolicited ones.
Much as we, marketers, hate these changes, we have to admit they’re needed. Google’s built-in defenses stop 15 million spam, malware, or phishing emails from reaching their destination daily.
Email marketing is growing in popularity. For us, ethical marketers who don’t try and sell “Viagra” to unsuspecting recipients, it’s a hassle. For email users, it’s a blessing.
Worry not, though; it’s not the end of the world, and these changes might actually benefit you: less spam means more room for good emails — like yours!
By the way, you don’t need to worry about the SyncApps integrations affecting your delivery rates. We don’t handle email sending so you don’t need to take any action in your SyncApps dashboard. We’ll continue to support you through this process with everything you need.
Google and Yahoo!’s New Inbox Protection Rules — Are You Affected?
Short answer: yes, if you send more than 5,000 emails in a day.
You can either split up your campaigns into smaller segments (we don’t recommend it, though) or:
- Authenticate your sending domain
- Stay below a spam-rate threshold (0.3%)
- Allow one-click unsubscribes
We’ll dig into these below, but how about we commiserate a bit before that?
Why It Sucks
Email marketing is our refuge from fickle social media algorithms. As marketers, we know that, if we keep a clean list, we can usually reach ±50% of our subscribers with every campaign — that doesn’t happen on social media. If you’re lucky, you’ll reach 10% of your audience with your posts, often much less.
Plus, email is cheap to send and has an incredible 4200% ROI! Beat that, Elon and Mark!
With most users on either Gmail or Yahoo!, these new policies will impact all email marketers. And I suspect it’s only the beginning — we’ll start seeing stricter email policies in the future.
All this to say: make the most of email marketing now while it’s still incredibly cheap and very easy to use.
Integrate email marketing solutions like Mailchimp, Constant Contact, ActiveCampaign, and others with Salesforce, NetSuite, and more. Leverage your email insights to get the best possible ROI.
How to Make it Suck Less
You still have time before February 2024, but we suggest making these updates as soon as possible.
- Prove You Say Who You Say You Are (Authenticate Your Domain)
Sending bulk email addresses from free providers like Gmail will no longer work. You need your own domain to prove you are who you say you are and to avoid getting blocked by spam filters.
If you send emails from [email protected], switch to a new domain and a new email address like [email protected].
- Allow One-Click Unsubscribes
Don’t make your subscribers jump through hoops to opt out of your email list. You can still add a survey after they unsubscribed but they need to be unsubscribed the moment they clicked the link.
More importantly, do NOT contact them again! If they need you, they’ll find their way back to you.
- Keep Your Spam Rate Low
Google says senders with a spam rate of over 0.3% won’t be able to get their emails into Gmail inboxes anymore.
I know, you’re not a spammer. Spam complaints, however, happen to the best of us.
This resource by Mailchimp is a good primer on how to avoid spam filters.
Go the extra mile and enhance your sender reputation:
- Enable double opt-ins. Get people to confirm their subscription to your list so you know that none of your subscribers got there by accident.
- Get your subscribers to add your email to their contacts list. This will ensure that you stay out of the dreaded Promotions or Spam folders. Give them instructions in your Welcome sequence.
- Allow subscribers to self-segment. Tell them they can opt-in for some of your emails only and not receive the others.
- Remove inactive subscribers. If a subscriber didn’t engage with your emails in the last couple of months, it’s safe to say they’re not interested anymore. Delete them or send them a final email asking them to take action (click on a link) if they want to keep receiving your emails.
Open rates are no longer reliable, so I understand why you wouldn’t want to delete subscribers based on them alone. A better alternative is to integrate your email automation platform with your CRM or ESP, like Salesforce or NetSuite.
This way, you can see if subscribers visited your website or engaged with your sales reps/SMS campaigns/social media campaigns recently. If they did, keep them on — their opens may simply not be reflected in your email platform.
Why lose valuable subscribers? Start integrating your mission-critical solutions for free.
- Set Up Your DMARC Record
If you send over 5,000 emails per day, you need to set up a DMARC record. DMARC stands for Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance.
Essentially, DMARC records are txt records in your domain DNS settings. This record ensures that your emails are actually coming from the domain you say they are coming from. If you ever got a phishing email from DHL or from an email address that looked like it was from your own company, you already know why this matters.
DMARC keeps you safe from phishing and spoofing attacks by checking that your SPF (Sender Policy Framework) and DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail) records are aligned.
This is a good primer on how to set up DMARC for your domain. We recommend contacting your email automation platform to ask for their guidance on this — it’s not an easy feat if you don’t have a technical background.
Alternatively, you can always work with an email deliverability specialist and use online checkers to see if everything is set up correctly.
Safer, Cleaner Inboxes Benefit Us All
Despite our earlier commiseration, I think we both know this is not a bad thing in the grand scheme of things. Yes, you need to make some tweaks, and your list might shrink. But let’s be honest: how many of those inactive subscribers would have bought anything from you?
If we can support you with this transition in any way, don’t hesitate to reach out to us!
