Guides / Email Deliverability
Why Do My Emails Go to Spam?
Your emails go to spam because nothing proves they came from you. Any sender can type your address in the From field, so mail providers check three DNS records instead — SPF, DKIM and DMARC. Set up wrong, or set up in the wrong order, they send your own mail to the spam folder. Getting this right is part of every site we build on the web design side.
Why does my own email get treated as spam?
Because anyone can type any address in the From field, so the receiving server has no reason to believe the message is from you.
It is the return address on an envelope. Writing it does not prove anything. Mail providers deal with that by asking whether the domain owner has vouched for the server that sent the message, and if you have never answered that question, the honest answer they get back is no.
What are SPF, DKIM and DMARC?
Three DNS records that answer three different questions about a message claiming to be from your domain.
SPF lists the servers allowed to send as you. DKIM adds a cryptographic signature proving the message really came from you and was not altered on the way. DMARC tells the receiving server what to do when a message fails the other two — nothing, quarantine it, or reject it outright.
Which order do you set them up in?
Authentication first, policy second. SPF and DKIM before DMARC, always.
This is where most small businesses go wrong. Somebody reads a security article, adds a strict DMARC policy, and never sets up the SPF or DKIM that would let a message pass it. You have then published a rule saying reject anything that fails, and given the receiving server no way to succeed. Your own mail is the mail it catches.
One rule worth remembering
Whenever you send email through somebody else's service, connect your domain to it first and add the records they give you. Otherwise your own policy is what sends your mail to spam.
Why did it break when I started using an email tool?
Because the mail now leaves that company's servers wearing your name, which is indistinguishable from someone impersonating you.
A newsletter platform, a booking system, a contact form, an invoicing tool — each one sends as you from infrastructure you do not own. Every one of them offers a way to connect your domain, and every one of them is optional to set up, which is why it usually gets skipped.
How do I know this is what is wrong?
The signature symptom is mail landing in spam for some recipients and not others, with nothing wrong in the message itself.
Gmail is usually the first to filter, because it enforces most strictly. If your confirmation emails reach a colleague on the same office system but land in spam for customers on Gmail, the message is not the problem. The proof is not in the email — it is in your DNS.
What does fixing it actually involve?
Adding a handful of DNS records at your domain registrar, then waiting for them to publish.
Each sending service hands you the exact records it needs. They go in wherever your DNS lives, which is often not the same company that hosts your website. Two traps account for most failures: registrars silently append your domain to what you type in the name field, and a second SPF or DMARC record invalidates the first rather than adding to it. Publishing can take minutes or hours, so a failed check often just means waiting.
How do I stay out of spam once it is fixed?
Send to people who asked, make unsubscribing easy, and confirm new subscribers before you mail them.
Authentication only earns the right to be judged on merit. After that it is engagement: opens, replies, and the absence of complaints. Double opt-in helps twice over, since typos and throwaway addresses never confirm and never enter your list in the first place.
Not sure whether yours are set up?
It takes a few minutes to check, and the answer is either fine or a short list of records to add. Either way you stop guessing why a customer never got the email.
Want your email setup checked?
Tell us your domain and which tools send on your behalf, and we will tell you what is missing.
Minnesotans will always give you directions to anywhere, but we will never share your contact info. Ever.
You're in.
Milk's on the way — check your email to confirm.