Eloqua Blog · Email Deliverability

Part 3. Eloqua Email Deliverability Factors That You Control

A practical look at the Eloqua deliverability levers your team can actually influence: list quality, frequency, relevance, content, sender score, IP reputation and domain reputation.

📅 First published: Sep 7, 2021

⏱ Reading time: 5 minutes • 👤 Author: Greg Staunton • 🎯 Focus: Eloqua deliverability, sender reputation, IP reputation, domain reputation

This is part 3 of my Eloqua email deliverability series. I strongly advise you to start from Part 1, which covers the objective of Eloqua email deliverability. If you already have, crack on.

Greg Staunton

It is completely within your control to experiment with these elements. Some of them drastically affect Eloqua email deliverability, while others are less relevant.

Eloqua Contact List Or Segment Quality

You should always consider list and segment quality, especially if you are a new sender or your IP address is changing. It is the only information ISPs know about you at the start.

Eloqua Email Frequency And Relevance

Your ISP will be stricter if you send email every day. Segment your list, avoid sending the same message to everyone and think carefully about personalisation and engagement.

Eloqua Email Content And Format

Sender reputation matters, but content still counts. Poorly written, spammy messages will make deliverability harder, even if the sender has built a decent reputation.

Sender Score

Sender score is extremely important, but it can be harder to influence directly than list quality, frequency or relevance. Watch it carefully.

What Determines Sender Reputation?

It is normal for a reputation to fluctuate between good and average. If you have a large campaign coming up and need to send a lot of emails to a segment that is not very engaged, this can lower your reputation.

IP reputation and domain reputation both contribute to sender reputation. Each is calculated separately, but together they have a significant impact on Eloqua email deliverability.

What Is IP Reputation?

Every email is sent from a computer or server with a unique identifier: its IP address. An IP address makes it easy for ISPs to track senders.

Reputation is determined by the IP address from which an email is sent, not by the brand sending it. Your reputation with your IP address is what gets you into the recipient's server.

As a mail sender, you usually either have a dedicated IP address or use a shared IP pool.

Dedicated IP Address

A dedicated IP address means all your emails are routed through one IP address that cannot be used by anyone else. It relies entirely on your own sending practices, which can be a benefit if you follow best practice.

Mistakes can have a major impact and can be difficult to undo, but a dedicated IP also makes whitelisting easier. Large organizations sending high volumes of mail are usually better suited to this model.

Shared IP Pool

Shared IP pools allow several companies to share IP addresses for email campaigns. Eloqua email deliverability becomes a shared responsibility, so another company's poor practices can affect you.

The benefit is volume uplift. Smaller senders can gain from the wider pool, and if a small sender makes an error, the impact is often limited because there is much more email coming from the shared pool.

What Is Domain Reputation?

Domain reputation is about the brand that sends the email, rather than only the IP reputation behind it.

A good domain reputation can grow with your brand even when you switch IP addresses or email providers. If your reputation has been built over time, this can be very helpful.

Domain reputation is affected by your business sector. ISPs generally have a more stringent policy for finance and banking companies and a more lenient policy for retail and travel companies.

It is also affected by your sending style. Do you segment your lists? Do you send messages to inactive accounts? Do less engaged audiences receive fewer emails? These all affect your domain reputation.

Key point

A segmented mailing list is one of the best ways to maintain your reputation.

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