Google & Yahoo Sender Requirements

Learn how to be compliant with the recent Sender requirements from Google and Yahoo

Google & Yahoo have recently announced that they will be imposing certain restrictions, especially for the bulk email senders, starting from February 1, 2024.

The requirements applies everyone, and the new rule has certain requirements for bulk senders, who send at least 5000 emails per day.

Watch the step-by-step video tutorial for setting up your sending domain and authenticate your emails to meet the requirements.

Who needs to be compliant ?

All email senders. Yes. It applies to all email senders. Any email senders or brands that send more than 5000 emails per day to Google/Yahoo accounts will meet these requirements compulsorily. If these new requirements aren’t met, you'll start experiencing deliverability issues with emails sent to Google and Yahoo email addresses.

How to prepare your account to be ready?

We have created a simple checklist that will help you meet these requirements easily. It's quite simple. Let's get started. NOTE: Make sure you have the access to your website's DNS control panel (like GoDaddy or Cloudflare). You will need it in order to add the DNS records.

1. Set up an Email "Sending Domain" & Verify the Domain

Retainful allows you to send emails with your own branding using the "Sending Domain" feature. This allows you to control your sender reputation and also removes our disclaimer in the from address (via retainful-mail.com). Once set up, the emails will carry your own sending domain signature and will help you improve your email deliverability. Setting up the "sending domain" will help you meet the requirements set by Google and Yahoo.

NOTE: We recommend using a sub-domain instead of your primary domain as your sending domain. Sub-domains can help build a better reputation without affecting the primary domain's reputation. This is important, since your primary domain will be sending a lot of transactional emails like order confirmation emails. So its good to use a sub-domain as sending domain for your marketing emails

Sending domain

Go to your Retainful dashboard -> Your Profile -> Account Settings -> Emails -> Sending Domain to start setting up.

Learn how to Set up your Sending Domain

CAUTION: The Sending domain feature is now available in all the plans including for Free users. The failure to set up a Sending domain will result in the email sending be paused until this step is completed.

2. Set up the From Email Address

Make sure that you have set up a From Email Address, which should feature either your root domain of your sending domain or the sending domain. For instance, if your sending domain is "send.example.com", then use something like [e-mail] or you can use your root domain as well like: [e-mail] In the Reply To email address field, you can give an email address where any replies to the emails will go.

From Email Address

3. Set up a DMARC policy for your parent domain

DMARC authentication is a system designed to make sure emails are coming from a legitimate sender.

DMARC policies are published in the DNS as TXT records, similar to SPF and DKIM records, in your DNS provider like GoDaddy or Cloudflare. DMARC records are checked by email servers when processing incoming emails. This system helps in reducing email fraud and increasing the reliability of email by ensuring that only authenticated emails are delivered If you do not already have a DMARC policy in place, configure a DMARC policy on your root domain with values as:

v=DMARC1 p=none;

4. Always include Unsubscribe links

New regulations now require every email to include a one-click 'Unsubscribe' link. Don't worry, Retainful automatically adds this for you in the email header, so it's one less thing for you to think about.

For best practices, we also recommend including an 'Unsubscribe' link in your email footer. In case it's missing, Retainful will detect this and automatically insert the link in the footer too. Rest assured, we've got you covered!

Known Issues

The following are some of the known issues you will encounter when adding the DNS records to your hosting or DNS service provider like GoDaddy.

1. Host Names handling differs for some DNS providers

Some hosting service providers like GoDaddy will ask you to enter only the "Name" without the "Root domain"

For instance, when you try to add the following TXT record:

Name	Type	Value
send.example.com	TXT	v=spf1 include:spf.retainful.net ~all

GoDaddy will automatically show the root domain. In the above table, "example.com" is the root domain. "send" is the subdomain.

So you just need to enter the subdomain value, which is "send"

DO NOT enter the root domain if it already appended by your DNS Provider.

If you do, then the "Name" value will become like:

send.example.com.example.com

The above will fail the verification.

So just enter the "Subdomain" value.

Need help ?

Reach out to our support team at https://www.retainful.com/support or just schedule a quick Zoom call using the following link: https://zcal.co/rameshelamathi/retainful