Introduction

What happens when security and style combine? Enter BIMI, or Brand Indicators for Message Identification, a text record that lives in your DNS records and helps verify your email address against phishers with malicious intent. This verification can be found in the brand’s logo, conveniently embedded in a sender’s email.

While this high-tech security option may be a tough bet for small creators working alone, if you’ve got a large following and an equally large team, BIMI is a great way to increase your security. 

According to the Harvard Business Review, companies are falling victim to hackers at an alarming rate, with COVID and remote work leaving us vulnerable to keyboard bandits and email spoofing more than ever before. Needless to say, security is important, and anything you can do to protect your own brand and the privacy of your subscribers saves you face and money. If you can add a personal branded touch, all the better. 

In this episode, Alyssa and Melissa discuss the importance of mixing style with security, the technicalities behind implementing BIMI, and why security is so important for big brands, small creators, and everyone in between. 

Key Takeaways

• [05:08] - The goal of BIMI is to provide another layer of trust to your emails. With the embedded logo, subscribers can verify that the email is coming from your brand. 
• [10:05] - While massive data breaches aren’t a top concern for the average creator, email spoofing can happen to anyone, and BIMI protects against spoofing. 
• [12:06] - To start using BIMI, you have to be using a strict DMARC record. BIMI is incentivizing senders to use DMARC. 
• [17:38] - Aside from setting up a strict DMARC record, if you’re a ConvertKit user, you have to set up a verified sending domain. 
• [19:51] - You must also have a proper TXT record in your DNS. 
• [21:55] - Keep in mind that not all mailbox providers support BIMI. Yahoo, AOL, Netscape, Gmail, G Suite, and Fastmail are mailbox providers that do.

Quotes

[11:45] - “We care a lot that email is a safer place and that people aren’t being spoofed. And then, on the other end, a lot of people who send mail probably aren’t as interested, don’t care as much about it. But [BIMI] gives them an incentive to start to really crack down on their security.” ~ @alyssa_dulin

[18:17] - “I feel like people think that they have to have all these things. A lot of new senders think, ‘Oh I need to change things in my DNS settings and I need to add a DMARC record’, and you don’t have to do anything. It’s not like those things will make you land in the inbox more often.” ~ @mel_lambert_

[19:03] - “At the end of the day, [BIMI] encourages people, or it should encourage people, to really work on their sender reputation if they want to have these things set up, which is a good thing.” ~ @mel_lambert_

Links

• Deliverability Defined 0106: Authentication (SPF, DKIM, DMARC)
• The 10 Biggest Ransomware Attacks of 2021
• Using a Verified Domain for Email Sending
• Generate Your BIMI Record
• Yahoo
• AOL
• Netscape
• Gmail
• G Suite
• Fastmail 
• DMARC
• Outlook

Connect with our hosts

• Alyssa Dulin
• Melissa Lambert

Stay in touch

• Apple Podcasts
• Spotify
• Twitter
• Facebook
• Instagram
• Deliverability Defined Website

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