Deliverability is mostly setup you do once and then protect. This playbook gets your domain authenticated and warmed so email reaches the inbox.

What this isA step-by-step playbook to authenticate and warm your sending domain.

You give itDNS access and your sending platform.

You get backSPF, DKIM, and DMARC in place, a warmup schedule, and what to monitor.

The steps

  1. Pick a sending subdomain (for example mail.yourcompany.com) so marketing volume cannot hurt your main domain's reputation.
  2. Set up SPF: publish one SPF record listing every service allowed to send for the domain. More than one SPF record breaks it.
  3. Set up DKIM: turn on signing in your sending platform and publish the key it gives you. This proves the mail is really from you.
  4. Set up DMARC: publish a record starting at p=none to monitor, read the reports, then move to quarantine once SPF and DKIM are aligned.
  5. Warm up the domain: start with small volumes to your most engaged contacts and increase gradually over two to four weeks. Do not blast a cold list on day one.
  6. Clean the list first: remove role addresses, hard bounces, and contacts who have not engaged in a long time. Engagement drives placement.
  7. Monitor: watch bounce rate, complaint rate, and DMARC reports. Treat a spike as a stop-and-fix, not a footnote.

Template to start from

Keep a one-page record of your SPF, DKIM, and DMARC values and where they are hosted, plus your warmup schedule. When deliverability dips, this is the first page you check.