Achieving Compliance: Meeting Google and Yahoo's Email Sender Requirements in 2024

From February 2024, Google and Yahoo require email senders to implement email authentication and follow important policy changes around consent and engagement. If you don't comply, your emails may be delayed, blocked, or marked as spam. These changes are grounded in established best practices to keep email delivery working properly.

Preparing Your Account

Follow our checklist to meet the new sender requirements set by Google and Yahoo.

Enhance Your Brand with a Branded Sending Sub-Domain

Strengthen your sender reputation and improve inbox branding by setting up a branded sending sub-domain. This removes the "sent via msgsndr.com" disclaimer and improves deliverability. It's essential for bulk senders targeting Google and Yahoo recipients.

📌 Note: After enabling your branded sending sub-domain, you may need to gradually warm up your sending infrastructure over the next 2 to 4 weeks. For guidance, refer to our detailed guide on setting up a branded sending sub-domain.

Implement DMARC Email Authentication for Your Sending Domain

DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance) is a standard that builds on SPF and DKIM to tell mailbox providers how to handle emails that fail these checks. If you don't yet have a DMARC record and are sending more than 5,000 emails daily (aggregated for accounts using a shared sending domain), you should add one to your DNS.

Steps for Implementation

• Use a free DMARC checker like Dmarcian to verify whether a DMARC record exists for your domain. If it's validated, no further action is required.
• If not, create a TXT DNS record via your DNS hosting provider. Set the Host/Name value as "_DMARC" and use the content: "v=DMARC1; p=none;". Google recommends gradually tightening your DMARC policy, as outlined in their DMARC Rollout Tutorial.
• After saving the record, use Dmarcian to confirm it's been added successfully.

• Save or submit and use Dmarcian to verify the DMARC record has successfully been added. You can also check by sending yourself an email and inspecting the header. Please note that it can take a few minutes to register.

In Gmail, you can inspect the header of an email by clicking the three-dots icon and selecting the "Show More" option. Here's what the header will look like for an email sent from a domain with a valid DMARC record in place:

Ensure Brand Consistency

Keep a consistent, recognisable email identity by aligning your "from" address with your branded domain. This alignment is needed to meet DMARC standards. For example, if your branded sending domain is "lc.msgsndr.com," your "from" address should be "hello@msgsndr.com."

Review all "from" addresses in your email flows and campaigns to make sure they match the root domain of your branded sending domain.

Avoid Using Gmail or Yahoo Domains in 'From' Headers

Gmail and Yahoo are enforcing stricter DMARC policies, including 'quarantine.' Sending emails that appear to come from Gmail or Yahoo domains could harm delivery. To avoid this, make sure your emails don't use 'example@gmail.com' or 'example@yahoo.com' in the "from" headers.

Make it Easy to Unsubscribe

It's now mandatory to make the unsubscribe process straightforward for recipients. If you use LC Email Service, enabling this option will automatically add an unsubscribe link to the footer of all your emails. A one-click unsubscribe link will also be included in the email header, except for 1:1 emails.

Before February, review your campaign templates and flow emails to confirm an unsubscribe link is present, typically in the footer. It doesn't need to be one-click, but it should be easy to find.

Streamlined Unsubscribing: One-Click Solution

Good news: meeting the new requirement for a one-click unsubscribe link in every email is straightforward. A one-click unsubscribe link is automatically added to the header of each email you send, except for 1:1 emails.

To clarify, "header" here refers to the behind-the-scenes information in your email, which includes details about the sender and message authentication. The one-click list-unsubscribe feature is built into the code for every message. The way it appears may vary across email platforms; a visual example from Gmail is shown below.

Make sure there's an unsubscribe link in your email body too. The footer is the typical place for it. It doesn't need to be one-click, but it should be clear and easy for recipients to find.

Optimise Email Delivery: Keep Your Spam Rate Below 0.30%

Making sure your recipients have opted in to receive your emails is essential for keeping your spam rate low. A high spam complaint rate (3 complaints per 1,000 emails) can cause delivery problems, such as emails being delayed, sent to spam, or blocked. Aim to keep spam complaints below 1 per 1,000 emails.

To monitor Yahoo spam complaints, check the Spam Reports in your NotLuck CRM. Gmail spam complaints can't be tracked within email metrics due to privacy protocols, but Google Postmaster Tools can help you monitor these and ensure smooth email delivery.