Email warming is a fundamental process that every marketer should know. It is a crucial step to ensure that your emails are delivered successfully and reach the intended recipients. In this article, we will discuss what email warming is, the steps involved in performing it, and how to make the most of your efforts in doing so.
We’ll also explain why choosing to use email warm-up tools can be worthwhile when it comes to speeding this process up. Let’s get started!
What Does It Mean to ‘Warm Up’ an Email?
Email warming, sometimes referred to as email warm-up or IP warming, is the process of gradually increasing the volume and frequency of emails sent from a server. This is done to ensure that the IP address associated with the domain has a good reputation and that any emails sent from it won’t be marked as spam.
Warm-up is particularly important when sending out messages to a large list of recipients. Sending a large number of emails all at once can cause ISPs to block any future messages from that IP address, so it’s important to spread out the emails over a period of days or weeks.
When warm-up is done correctly, it helps build trust with ISPs (Internet Service Providers), enabling them to recognize messages as legitimate and reducing their likelihood of going directly into the recipients’ spam folders.
What Happens When You Don’t Warm Up Your Email?
When you don’t warm up your email, your messages are more likely to end up in recipients’ spam folders or blocked by their ISPs altogether. This is detrimental to engagement, and can contribute to decreased open and click-through rates.
And it can get even worse; sending out mass amounts of messages with a cold domain can cause your IP address to be blacklisted, making any emails it sends invalid regardless of whether you later warm it.
How Do You Warm Up an Email?
There’s no debating that email warming is an essential practice when sending out large volumes of emails. Undertaking it can be done in one of two ways: manually or with an automated tool. This section will explain each option in more detail.
Manual Email Warming
Manual email warming is a slightly tedious but effective process when executed properly. Here’s a general overview of what it involves.
Authenticating Your Email Account
New email accounts must be authenticated before use. Authentication is the process of proving one’s identity to another party, in this case the email provider. There are two main types of authentication methods used for email accounts.
The first is Sender Policy Framework (SPF), which is a protocol that works by comparing the domain from which a message is sent to a list of pre-authorized mail servers that are permitted to send messages from the domain. SPF plays an important role in helping reduce spam and phishing by making sure that the source of an email is valid.
DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) is another commonly used authentication method in the email warming process. It uses cryptographic signatures to verify that messages are authorized by the owner of the domain from which they’re sent.
The process of setting up authentication with SPF and DKIM is relatively straightforward and can be done via any email provider’s control panel.
Sending Individual Emails
Email warming starts off very slow, with individual messages sent to a limited first batch of recipients. While tedious, beginning small is essential to preventing your emails from being marked as spam.
In the beginning, send 10-20 emails to recipients you know are likely to open them. This is important because engagement metrics, like open rate and click-through rate, are what determine whether your emails will be received in the future.
You can gradually increase the volume as your emails prove to be non-spam and engagement grows. It’s best to diversify your list with as many domain services as possible – such as Gmail, Yahoo, and Hotmail – in order to reduce the risk of being blocked by any one provider.
Personalize and Engage
Sending messages in an incremental manner is only half the battle in email warm-up. It’s also important to personalize your messages and engage with recipients in order for them to open, read and take action on your emails.
Adding personalization to an email message can be as rudimentary as including the recipient’s name in the subject line or adding a signature with a company logo to the end of the message. If you’re really looking to get personal, the body of the message itself can be customized to increase its relevance to the recipient.
Aside from the content itself, it’s also important to personally engage with recipients after emails have been sent. Follow-ups, surveys, and other communication channels can help build relationships that will increase the likelihood of your emails being opened in the future.
Monitor and Adjust
Ultimately, the best way of warming up an email list is tracking engagement metrics and adjusting strategy accordingly. If emails are not being opened or are being marked as spam, it’s worth taking a pause to review their content, as well as their lists of recipients, to identify potential issues.
For example, if an email contains too many images or links, it may be flagged as spam. Lists filled with inactive subscribers also have a generally higher chance of being ignored.
Automated Email Warm Up
Proper email warm-up is supposed to take time. It can take anywhere from a few weeks to several months depending on the size of your given list and how you’ve chosen to stagger the process. The best practice is to start small and gradually build up your efforts over time.
But if you’re looking for a faster way to set up an email warm-up process, consider using an automated tool. Email warm-up automation tools are designed to streamline the process of domain warming, allowing you to get yours up and running quickly. They can create and execute an automated plan that segments your list, sends out emails at the right time, and tracks your progress for you.
Growbots offers a comprehensive, automated email warm-up tool that helps you ensure your emails are delivered to their intended recipients. Try it today.
