Email platforms are continuously improving spam and fraud protection to ensure consumers don’t become victims of fake emails. Adjusting your SPF records can improve email delivery when you allow third-party services to send emails on your behalf. If your email servers aren’t configured correctly some of your emails could get marked as spam and blocked.
What is an SPF Record?
SPF records are used to protect against spoofing—when another company sends an email from an address that appears to come from another company’s domain. Email platforms may mark emails as spam or block them completely if they appear to be sent from another mail server.
SPF—Sender Policy Framework—checks that an email sender is authorized to send emails on behalf of your domain. More specifically, SPF checks your DNS, or domain name server, records to see if the server is allowed to send emails from your domain.
Why Would I Need This?
Sometimes you want emails to be sent from another mail server, but include your domain’s email address in the FROM: section. This is common if you’re using another service for transactional emails or marketing campaigns. In this case, you need to update your SPF records to show that you authorize messages to be sent from that domain. Otherwise, the recipient’s mail server may block the email.
Setting Up SPF Records for Other Mail Servers
Most services provide help docs with instructions for adding their mail server to your DNS, or domain service records. Your DNS is the company that hosts your email servers and is often, but not always, the same company where you registered your domain.
The record has to be formatted a specific way, so it helps to double, even triple check your entry. If you’re not familiar with this process, your domain registrar, the company who registered your domain, can often help with the steps.
You can still send emails, even without updating the SPF records. However, some recipients may never receive messages if they’re marked as spam or blocked.
