Learning to leverage Google Postmaster tools the right way to monitor the performance of your IPs
A late 2023 poll found that over half of marketing professionals saw their email marketing ROI double, proving why email has remained a powerful tool since its launch in the 1970s. Now that more brands rely on email marketing for their brand growth, staying relevant in recipients’ inboxes is a challenge. The engagement rate shows positive growth only if your content is meaningful for the receivers. It’s all about figuring out what type of audience likes what and serving them exactly that.
But how would you know what works for whom?
Well, Google Postmaster Tools are your savior here. It’s a free way to get an idea of your reputation as an email marketer. It provides you with key metrics that enable you to create the perfect sauce for the recipe. It works by monitoring the performance of your IPs. Please ensure that you validate proper ownership of your domain by visiting https://postmaster.google.com/ before you start leveraging Google Postmaster tools.
Setting up Google Postmaster tools
After verifying the ownership of your domain in Google Postmaster Tools, access data points for your domain/IPs. Google collects these in spam rate, IP reputation, domain reputation, authentication, encryption, and delivery errors.
Note that Google Postmaster Tools shows data only for days with a certain email volume, though the exact threshold is unknown. Generally, reports are generated when you send over 100 emails in a day. The data isn’t real-time; the reports are always 48 hours behind because Google has to process a large amount of data, which increases the workload.
Understanding the metrics
These are the metrics that Google Postmasters tools show us-
Spam rate
The spam rate is the percentage of total emails sent that are marked as spam by recipients or email providers. If your domain’s spam rate is high, your sender’s reputation will take a toll, reflecting adverse effects on email deliverability. In such cases, emails sent from your domain are highly likely to get blocked or rejected. Gmail considers it as one of the key factors in assessing a sender’s trustworthiness.
Gmail strongly advises maintaining a spam rate of less than 0.10% in Google Postmaster Tools. You must avoid reaching a spam rate of 0.30% or higher. This will make your domain more resilient to occasional spikes in user feedback.
IP reputation
IP reputation simply means how Gmail (and other ESPs) evaluate an IP address based on its past sending behavior. If your IP reputation is good, there are higher chances of your emails reaching the inboxes of recipients instead of getting flagged. Gmail categorizes senders as having a bad, low, medium, or high reputation.
If you own a new IP, you are strongly advised to warm it up by gradually increasing the email volume. Otherwise, it will be flagged, and you will get in trouble.
Also, IP reputation and spam rates are interconnected. High spam complaint rates can quickly degrade an IP’s reputation and vice versa.
Domain reputation
Just like how your IP is the numerical address that transports the right messages, your domain name is the address people know you by. Domain name is usually your brand name, and no business can afford to jeopardize its value. With Google Postmaster Tools, you get insights into activities and determine how Google views your domain based on the feedback it receives from its users.
Maintaining a good domain reputation requires consistent sending practices, strong authentication, and high user engagement to avoid spam filters and ensure optimal email deliverability.
Authentication
Authentication includes the percentage of emails that pass SPF, DKIM, and DMARC checks over all emails that underwent the authentication process. As of February 2024, Google has also made it mandatory for bulk senders to implement DMARC. DuoCircle can help ensure that your email security standards meet these requirements, enhancing deliverability and protection. Read more about it here.
Encryption
This dashboard shows the percentage of your email, both inbound and outbound traffic, that is encrypted.
Delivery errors
The Google Postmasters Tools also shows delivery errors in which you see the percentage of rejected or temporarily failed emails compared to all authenticated emails sent. Temporary failed emails are the ones that aren’t delivered immediately but might be retried. This can happen due to:
- Rate limiting, as Gmail imposes restrictions on the maximum number of emails you can send. This helps avoid sudden spikes in volume.
- Greylisting, in which Gmail temporarily defers emails from new or unknown senders.
- Temporary server issues on the sender’s or Gmail’s side.
Gmail’s unique Feedback Loop (FBL)
Gmail has a Feedback Loop that works differently from others. If you want to use it to track data in Google Postmaster Tools, simply visit Gmail’s support center and learn the setup requirements. You will get to know how to use the data effectively so that the direct insights help you improve your domain reputation, and your email marketing efforts pay off well. After all, you are getting insights from Gmail itself!