Deliverability Defined

A Guide to Google Postmaster Tools

Mar 5, 2024

26:48

If you’ve ever wondered how to improve your domain reputation, Google Postmaster Tools is here to help. In the wake of Google’s and Yahoo’s changes and authentication requirements, Google Postmaster Tools has become a crucial resource for email senders. In this episode of Deliverability Definied, Alyssa and Melissa take a deep dive into Google Postmaster Tools—what it is, how to get the most out of it, and why it’s so important for monitoring domain reputation and ensuring optimal email deliverability.

While Google Postmaster Tools can provide a lot of great insight, the best deliverability strategies are still basic best practices. Things like maintaining a low spam complaint rate, prioritizing engagement, list hygiene, and ethical list-building practices. By following these guidelines senders can enhance their domain reputation, increase inbox placement, and ultimately, improve the effectiveness of their overall email marketing efforts.

In this episode, we discuss:

01:16 - Google Postmaster Tools overview
08:11 - Domain reputation explained
11:11 - Spam complaint rates
19:24 - Why it's more important than ever to clean your list
21:48 - Using automations for list health
23:18 - Understanding IP reputation

Key Takeaways

Google Postmaster Tools can give you insights into your domain reputation, which plays a crucial role in your email deliverability. Aim for a high domain reputation to secure solid inbox placement.
Managing spam complaint rates is key to maintaining a positive sender reputation. Keep your complaint rate below 0.1% to avoid negative impacts on your domain reputation and email deliverability.
Pay attention to your list health by cleaning your list, avoiding excessive emails to new subscribers, and ensuring engagement with your content.
Implementing strategies like double opt-ins for new subscribers and automations to manage inactive subscribers can help improve your list health and reduce spam complaints.

Quotes

“It's important to keep your spam rate below 0.1%. This is the threshold where Gmail will start sending some messages to spam and potentially from there decrease your domain reputation. At 0.3% and above, spam filtering will start to happen, and the domain damage will also start to happen and be more impactful and harder to recover from.” ~ Melissa Lambert

“I encourage all people to have their eyes on the Google Post Master tools dashboard every day. Go analyze people who are complaining. What do they have in common? Are you sending them way too many emails?” ~ Alyssa Dulin

Links

Connect with our hosts

Stay in touch

Try ConvertKit's deliverability in action

It's now free to use ConvertKit with an audience of 1,000 subscribers or less! Start building your audience and reaching their inboxes: convertkit.com/pricing.