How To Warm Up a New Domain

Improving email deliverability requires email domain warming. Learn how to warm up email domain in this article.
Email domain warming is how you establish a positive sending reputation for a new domain, or new email address, or revive an email that has not been used in a while.

The process involves gradually and methodically adding volume to a new IP or address (IP warming) over days or weeks to create a positive reputation. This means you are sending out many emails, but you should also be getting responses for it to actually work.

It can be done manually by emailing people in your company who will respond to you and keep the email thread going.

Or, you can use an email warm-up tool, such as Unfiltered, to automatize the process and make it much easier. These tools send out emails for you and craft responses to better your reputation.

Read our guide: "Manual vs Automate Email Warm-Up" to learn more.

Why do You Need to Warm Up Your Email?

As it says above, warming up your email means making sure it avoids the spam box.

If you’re interested in making sales or reaching out to prospects, you need to ensure your email ends up in the right place. Having a clever subject line or amazing email copy is not enough to make sure your email is read.

If your sender reputation, new address, or domain is not positive, you will end up in the spam box, no matter what. And then your email will really not be read.

This means all the time spent perfecting your messaging and subject line, and researching your prospects to personalize that email, was for naught.

In the past, you might have been forgiven for thinking that whether your email ended up in your prospect's spam folder was beyond your control. But this is no longer the case.

In the 2020s, ensuring your email lands in your prospect’s inbox is possible and something you can ascertain. It is up to your email copy and subject line to grab their attention to make a good first impression.

So long as you follow some do’s and don’t’s of email domain warming, you can ensure that you will always land in the inbox.

Do’s and Don’t’s Of Email Domain Warming

Don’t Send Emails Right Away From a New Domain

If you’ve received a new email address or domain or are using an older email that has not been used in a while, the last thing you want to do is start sending emails to your prospects immediately.

It is highly likely that those emails are not entering the correct inbox, so you are spending time and effort crafting email copy and putting together lead lists that will never make it.

Do Check Email Deliverability Stats Before Starting Outreach

As we’ll see below, some tools help you check your domain's email deliverability.

This means that before you start any new outreach from a new domain or address, you can run a check to see its sending reputation. These tools will often provide tips to improve it, such as setting up the DMARC, SPF or DKIM.

Beyond that, they will show you whether you are hitting spam in specific domains. If you are, you know how to improve your sender's reputation.

Warm up your email.

Don't Assume Your Messaging Is Safe From The Spam Folder

You might think your messaging is impeccable and nothing is wrong with it.

This assumption could cost you dearly.

The words in your messaging that can send you to spam increase daily, and even something as attractive and simple as ‘free trial’ can send you to spam.

Do Check Your Messaging For Spam Trigger Words Before Sending

It may seem like an extra chore, but you will be happy to do so.

Email deliverability tools help, but running your messaging through a spam trigger-words checklist before even testing out the deliverability is a great way to cross it out as a reason you are being sent to spam.

And checking it means you know what words to avoid in your messaging!
Improve your email deliverability with Unfiltered.ai

Don't Forget To Regularly Check Your Email Deliverability

Just because you’ve achieved a good sending reputation doesn't mean it will be maintained.

If you’re a sales or marketing professional, or entrepreneur, reaching out to prospects daily, you are probably emailing fifty or more people per day on average. You do not always get responses; sometimes, they might move you to spam or block you.

This will harm that sending reputation, but you won’t know if you assume you’re fine after achieving it once.

Do Monitor Deliverability On a Weekly Basis & Use Warm-Up Tools as Needed

To avoid a dip in your sending reputation, make sure you’re checking your email’s deliverability on a regular basis.

Weekly or biweekly checks are absolutely essential if you’re emailing over fifty people a day to know if you have to use your warm-up tool once again to ensure you receive responses and your sender reputation increases.

Don’t Rely on Any Warm-Up Tool

Warm-up tools are easy to find, but they’re not all going to offer you what you need.

Some sales platforms have a warm-up option added. While this is well and good, a lot of the time, another push is needed to obtain and maintain a positive sender reputation.

Especially if you are emailing a large number of folks daily.

Do Invest Time In Researching Which Warm-Up Tool is Right For You

Once you’ve determined to warm up your email, research what might work best for you and your needs.

Perhaps the option in the sales platform is enough, and you can ramp up your email amounts slowly.

Perhaps you need to improve your sender reputation quickly because your messaging is time-sensitive.

Perhaps you need an additional push because you use an older email domain with a terrible sender reputation.

Finding the tool that works best for you is key.

Don’t Ignore The Importance Of a Warm-Up Tool For Email Deliverability

Do not assume that simply running a weekly check on your email deliverability and having some back and forth with colleagues will be enough.

Warmup tools exist for a reason, and they can be an absolute game changer in terms of getting your email domain ready and accepted by your prospect’s inboxes.

Do Take The Time To Learn About Its Value & Explain It To Your Clients Or Managers

If you are seeing low open rates, responses, or high bounce rates, running an email deliverability check on your domain is worth it.

If your sender's reputation is low, take the time to learn how to fix it and what a warm-up tool is.

You need to be able to explain it to your clients or managers, so they can understand its importance to you doing your job. By being able to explain it to them, you show how well you understand your craft and can convince them to invest in a good warm-up tool to make everyone’s lives easier.

Email Warm Up Tools

There are some key email warm-up tools that anyone can use to establish a positive sender reputation.

There are three key elements you need, and based on those, we’ve listed a few below:

Email Deliverability Testing: GlockApps

GlockApps is how you can test your email deliverability.

It provides inbox delivery and spam filtering testing to help users determine and fix deliverability issues before sending the message to the recipients by sending a test email.

Users receive a report on how the email is delivered across major ISPs, if it's going to spam, and whether an ISP blocked the message.

It also lets you know if SPF and DKIM filters were triggered and suggest actions and ways to fix certain issues.

Email Domain Warming: Unfiltered

At Unfiltered, we’ve created a warm-up tool specifically for sales and marketing people, because we could not find one that worked well enough.

We are dedicated to improving your email deliverability to help your emails safely arrive at your prospects' and subscribers' inboxes.

No more time out in spam!

Cold Email Outreach: Amplemarket

Amplemarket is a sales enablement platform that has it all in one place: prospecting, sending, and email warm-up.

At Unfiltered, we use Amplemarket to search for prospects and send out email sequences. We do also turn on the warm-up feature, however, we find that it is often not enough.

Finding that we needed additional help from warm-up tools is why Unfiltered exists.

Conclusion

The right email warm-up tool can make or break your email deliverability.

And without a positive sending reputation, your emails will never reach your prospects.

Have Unfiltered warm-up your email, and avoid spam.
Related articles
Improve your email deliverability now.
email deliverability