Email sending related questions

[Dave A]

Hopefully we all agree spam is the enemy. However, if you have a website that generates emails such as a forum site, it seems getting all the settings right helps make sure the mail gets through.

My trail on this started with a discussion on MX entries, but like a loose thread in a jersey, it seems to be getting more complex all the time.

At this point I still seem to have a few problems and hopefully can get some ideas and suggestions here.

I looked up theforumsa on robtex http://www.robtex.com/dns/theforumsa.co.za.html and am bugged by the comment entire tld is rfc-ignorant. Guilty as charged, but being ignorant, I don't understand why exactly. Can anyone help/steer me in the right direction?

This quest for understanding led down all kinds of roads, but my other question for the time being - does anyone have any feedback on submitting for whitelisting at a site such as http://www.uribl.com/index.shtml
Does it help?
Is it worth it?
Any other comments?

 

[Dave A]

I looked up theforumsa on robtex http://www.robtex.com/dns/theforumsa.co.za.html and am bugged by the comment entire tld is rfc-ignorant. Guilty as charged, but being ignorant, I don't understand why exactly. Can anyone help/steer me in the right direction?

Forget that part - tracked down the problem. Anything with a .za zone extension is going to be listed as rfc-ignorant because they haven't defended the listing for over 3 years. That PITA I'll have to take up elsewhere.

So now the question remaining is whitelisting. Any feedback on that anyone?

 

[Dan]

Hello Dave and welcome to KH

I've never had to submit any domains for whitelisting and I have to question any organization that assumes if you do not submit to them for whitelisting then you're grey/black listed. Shouldn't it be innocent (whitelisted) till proven guilty?

I've never actually seen where BLs allow you to submit for whitelisting prior to being blacklisted but if they do and you're worried about your server's activity being seen as spam then you should probably do it.

You should also look at why it would be seen as spam and possibly change things a bit to lower your risk as it is ultimately you and your whole server that is at risk.

 

[Dave A]

The problem is you can be defined as guilty for pretty low send rates - as low as 5 emails per hour to some domains

So if you get ten registrations from the same organisation in short succession because someone really thinks everyone should join up you can suddenly end up flagged all over the place.

The crux of my problem is I'd like to be able to send out an email to our approx. 1200 registered, double opted-in/ email address confirmed members without incurring the wrath of the spam cop gods. And every time I've tried it so far, I've ended up having to request whitelisting from all sorts of bods despite setting heavily choked mail send rates.

Reading up, it seems having an SPF record in place helps (done). I'm still trying to figure out if it might be an idea to use port 587 rather than 25 for sending mail. But setting that up seems a PITA beyond my current understanding at the moment.

Just struggling to wrap my head around this. There isn't a "setting up a bulk email server for dummies" book on this somewhere? My site is growing all the time and with luck a base of 1200 will be small one day. Really need to get on top of this.