Email Deliverability: A Beginner's Guide to Reaching the Inbox

Most people assume their emails are being delivered. They write a newsletter, hit send, and move on.

Then they check their open rates. 8%. Maybe 12%. And they think it's a copywriting problem, or a subject line problem, or an audience problem.

Often it's none of those. The emails simply aren't landing in the inbox.

This guide covers everything a beginner needs to know to fix that — in plain language, with clear steps.

What "deliverability" actually means

Deliverability isn't just whether your email was "sent." It's whether it arrived in the primary inbox — not spam, not promotions, not junk.

Every time you send an email, Gmail, Outlook, and Apple Mail run it through an invisible scoring system. That score determines where it lands. This guide teaches you what they're scoring — and how to make sure you pass.

The three things that determine your score

Every deliverability factor — every checklist item, every DNS record, every engagement metric — falls under one of three categories:

1. Your reputation — who you are as a sender

2. Your content — what your emails look like

3. Your list — who you're sending to

Work through them in this order. Reputation first, always.

Part 1 — Your Reputation

Step 1: Set up your custom domain

If you're sending emails from a generic address (like a shared Nashra subdomain), you're not building a sender reputation. You're borrowing someone else's.

Your own domain — hello@yourbrand.com — is the foundation everything else is built on. Inbox providers track the history of your domain: how long it's been active, what you send, how people respond. That history becomes your reputation.

How to do it in Nashra: Go to Settings → Domains → Add sending domain. Follow the setup steps — it takes about 10 minutes.

Step 2: Authenticate your domain (SPF, DKIM, DMARC)

These three acronyms sound technical. They're not difficult. They're just DNS records — small pieces of text you add to your domain settings that prove to inbox providers that your emails are actually coming from you.

SPF — tells inbox providers which servers are allowed to send email from your domain.

DKIM — adds a digital signature to every email you send, proving it hasn't been tampered with.

DMARC — tells inbox providers what to do if SPF or DKIM fails (usually: reject the email).

Since February 2024, Gmail refuses to deliver bulk email from domains that don't have all three set up. This isn't optional.

How to do it in Nashra: When you add your custom domain, Nashra generates the exact DNS records you need and shows you where to add them in your domain provider (GoDaddy, Cloudflare, Namecheap, etc.). Once you paste them in and verify, you're done.

To check DMARC specifically, use the free tool at dmarc.postmarkapp.com.

Step 3: Understand shared vs. dedicated IPs

Your emails are sent from servers with IP addresses. Those IPs have reputations too.

On Nashra, you're on shared IPs by default — meaning you share sending infrastructure with other Nashra customers. This is actually good for most people. Established shared IPs already have positive reputations with inbox providers.

The risk only matters if your platform allows bad actors. Nashra's terms of service explicitly ban spam categories — cryptocurrency, cold email, supplements, gambling. This protects the IP reputation of everyone on the platform.

Bottom line: You don't need a dedicated IP unless you're sending millions of emails per month. Focus on the other steps first.

Step 4: Check if you're on a blacklist

If your open rates suddenly dropped and your authentication is fine, there's a chance your domain or IP ended up on a blacklist.

How to check: Go to mxtoolbox.com/blacklists.aspx and enter your domain. It checks dozens of blacklists in seconds.

If you're listed, the blacklist owner's site will have instructions for requesting removal. Most removals happen within a few days if the reason for the listing has been resolved.

Part 2 — Your Content

Step 5: Keep your email design simple

Gmail knows that real emails — the ones people care about — look simple. Text, maybe one image, a clear footer. Emails that look like websites (lots of columns, heavy graphics, multiple CTAs) go straight to Promotions.

Write your newsletters like a thoughtful person writes an email. Readable, clean, focused on one idea.

Nashra's editor produces clean email HTML automatically. You don't need to think about the code.

Step 6: Include a physical address and unsubscribe link

This is legally required under CAN-SPAM (US) and GDPR (EU). Missing either one is a red flag to spam filters.

Nashra automatically adds an unsubscribe link to every email. For your physical address, add it in Settings → Brand → Footer. You can use a PO box or registered business address.

Step 7: Watch your language

Certain words and patterns trigger spam filters — not because the filters are reading your content intelligently, but because spammers use those patterns constantly.

Avoid:

• Aggressive sales language ("ACT NOW", "LIMITED TIME ONLY", "FREE FREE FREE")

• References to industries associated with spam (crypto, forex, supplements, gambling)

• ALL CAPS sentences

• Excessive exclamation points!!!

Write naturally. If your email reads like a person wrote it for another person, it usually passes.

Step 8: Avoid these specific red flags

Four things that will reliably hurt your deliverability:

Image-only emails. Spam filters can't read images. An email that's mostly an image with minimal text looks suspicious. Always include meaningful text.

Link shorteners. Don't use bit.ly or similar services. They're heavily associated with spam. Link directly to your destination URL.

Attachments. Never attach files directly to your newsletter. If you're sending a PDF or lead magnet, upload it to Google Drive or Dropbox and share the link.

Outside image hosts. Don't embed images from random image hosting sites. Nashra hosts all images you upload automatically — this is already handled.

Part 3 — Your Email List

Step 9: Only email people who signed up

This should go without saying, but it's worth stating clearly: never send newsletters to people who didn't explicitly ask for them. No purchased lists. No scraped emails from LinkedIn. No adding people to your newsletter because you have their business card.

Beyond being illegal under GDPR, it guarantees high spam complaints — which will get your account suspended and your domain blacklisted.

Every subscriber in Nashra goes through a confirmed opt-in. This is your baseline protection.

Step 10: Encourage replies from new subscribers

Here's the most underrated deliverability tactic: ask your new subscribers to reply to your welcome email.

When someone replies, Gmail immediately moves your address into their "important" category. It's a strong signal that this sender matters to this person.

Set up a simple welcome automation in Nashra (Growth → Automations) that sends a first email asking a genuine question: "What made you subscribe? What are you hoping to get from this newsletter?" Then actually read the replies. Two wins in one action.

Step 11: Keep your open rate above 15%

If fewer than 15% of your subscribers are opening your emails, inbox providers start questioning whether your audience actually wants to hear from you.

The most common cause: subscribers who signed up a long time ago and stopped engaging. These people are dragging your average down.

What to do: Once a quarter, run a re-engagement campaign. Send one email to everyone who hasn't opened anything in 90 days, subject line: "Still want to hear from me?" If they don't open that one either, remove them.

A smaller, engaged list delivers better than a large, disengaged one. Every time.

Step 12: Monitor your spam complaint rate

Keep spam complaints below 0.1% — that's one complaint per thousand sends.

You can check this in Google Postmaster Tools (free, takes 5 minutes to set up). It shows your complaint rate specifically for Gmail recipients.

If your rate is climbing, the usual causes are: emails going to people who don't remember signing up, or a mismatch between what you promised when they subscribed and what you're actually sending.

Step 13: Handle bounces immediately

Soft bounces are temporary failures — the recipient's inbox was full, their server was down, etc. Don't resend the same email to a soft-bounced address. Nashra tracks these automatically.

Hard bounces are permanent — the email address doesn't exist or has blocked you entirely. These should be removed from your list immediately. Nashra removes hard bounces automatically.

Aim to keep your total bounce rate below 2%.

Quick diagnostic: what to check when something goes wrong

The short version

Do these things, in this order, and you've done everything possible:

1. Send from your own domain

2. Set up SPF, DKIM, and DMARC

3. Use a platform with clean shared IPs (like Nashra)

4. Write simple, text-forward emails

5. Only email people who opted in

6. Encourage replies from new subscribers

7. Remove unengaged subscribers regularly

8. Keep bounces and complaints low

Deliverability is not a one-time fix. It's a habit. The writers who consistently land in the inbox are the ones who consistently send things worth opening.

All of the technical setup in this guide — custom domains, authentication records, bounce management, list hygiene — is handled inside Nashra. Set up your newsletter →