Land in the inbox, not spam: a practical checklist

Deliverability sounds like a dark art, but most of it comes down to a short list of fundamentals. Mailbox providers ask three questions about every message: can the sender prove who they are, do people seem to want this mail, and does the sending pattern look human? Get those right and you'll reach the inbox far more often. Here's the full checklist — and what rootmail already handles for you.

1. Prove who you are

Authentication is table stakes. Before anything else, your domain needs three DNS records:

• SPF lists the servers allowed to send for your domain.
• DKIM signs every message so nobody can tamper with it in transit. rootmail generates and rotates DKIM keys for every sending domain — including each sub-tenant's — automatically.
• DMARC tells receivers what to do when a message fails the first two, and gives you reports on who's spoofing you. Start at p=none to observe, then move to quarantine and reject as your traffic proves clean.

Run the domain check in rootmail (Deliverability → your domain, or just ask the assistant "is my domain set up?") and it will grade SPF, DKIM, DMARC, and BIMI with copy-paste fixes for anything missing. BIMI — your logo next to the message in supporting inboxes — is optional, but it's a nice trust signal once DMARC is enforcing.

2. Warm up before you pour

Reputation is earned per domain and per IP, and providers distrust sudden volume from a quiet sender. If your domain is new, ramp up: hundreds of sends a day in week one, low thousands in week two, doubling as engagement holds. Send consistently — five thousand a day beats thirty-five thousand every Friday. If you're on a dedicated IP, the same logic applies to it.

3. Keep the list clean

Nothing burns reputation faster than mailing people who never asked or who left long ago.

• Let bounces and complaints do their job. rootmail suppresses hard bounces, complaints, and unsubscribes automatically and checks the list before every single send — you cannot accidentally re-mail someone who opted out.
• Bring your suppression history with you. If you're migrating, import your old provider's suppression export first, then your contacts. Reputation transfers with your hygiene, not your domain.
• Sunset the silent. If someone hasn't opened in months, slow down or stop. A smaller, engaged list outperforms a big cold one on every metric that matters.

4. Send things people open

Content still counts. The reliable rules: a subject line that tells the truth about what's inside; a from-name people recognize (and keep constant); one clear call to action; and a working unsubscribe link — hiding it just converts tired readers into complainers, and complaints cost far more than unsubscribes. rootmail renders a plain-text part alongside your HTML automatically, which both filters and humans appreciate.

5. Watch the numbers that matter

You can't manage what you don't measure. Three thresholds to keep in view:

• Bounce rate under 2%. Above that, your list quality is the problem.
• Complaint rate under 0.1%. Above that, your targeting or frequency is.
• Delivery rate at 98%+. Below that, work back through this checklist.

rootmail distills all of this into a 0–100 reputation score computed from your real outcomes, and every campaign and sequence shows its own sent → delivered → opened → clicked funnel, so a problem shows up in one send — not in next quarter's aggregate.

The checklist

1. SPF, DKIM, DMARC pass (and BIMI when you're ready) — verify in Deliverability.
2. New domain or IP? Ramp volume gradually and send on a steady rhythm.
3. Import suppressions before contacts when migrating.
4. Never buy lists; sunset silent subscribers.
5. Honest subject, consistent from-name, one CTA, visible unsubscribe.
6. Watch bounce (<2%), complaints (<0.1%), delivery (98%+), and your reputation score.

Run it top to bottom once, then let the monitoring tell you when anything drifts. That's the whole art.