DELIVERABILITY TOOLS

ZeroBounce Deliverability Tools help our customers diagnose and remediate email deliverability issues. These new tools include an Inbox Placement Tester, Email Server Tester, Blacklist Monitoring service, DMARC monitor and a newly-launched email Warmup service. These work in conjunction with our core business service, email list validation.

The Inbox Placement Tester checks if your emails/newsletters will make it to your recipient’s inbox. This test will allow you to send an email to different mailbox providers around the world and quickly check to see the folder placement of that email (Inbox, Spam, Promotions).

The Inbox Placement Tester uses over 20 different global mailbox providers. This test can diagnose deliverability errors and grant insight into how different mailbox providers handle your email campaigns.

Important Note: If you send out a single email with multiple recipients and CC's, it may be flagged as spam. Please send out multiple emails when testing with fewer To/CC's for better results.

How to use the Inbox Placement Tester

I. Sender email

1. Click the ‘Create New Test’ button.

2. Enter a unique test name.
Select the test type - Sender email

Disclaimer:
Please be mindful of the number of seeds you select per mailbox provider. Using too many seeds for any one provider may resemble spam-like behavior — particularly with providers where your mailbox has little to no prior engagement. For the most reliable and accurate test outcomes, we recommend that you balance seed usage across providers and avoid excessive volume to a single domain.

3. Fill the Sender email field with the exact From address that will send the test (e.g., newsletters@brand.com).

4. Copy the newly generated email addresses and add them to a new mailing list, or create a new campaign using your email service provider.

5. Send your email to the list of provided email addresses.

II. Unique ID

1. Click the ‘Create New Test’ button.

2. Enter a unique test name.
Select the test type - Unique ID

3. Copy the newly generated email addresses and add them to a new mailing list, or create a new campaign using your email service provider AND Copy the unique test code to your test email body.

5. Send your email to the list of provided email addresses.

Disclaimer:
Please be mindful of the number of seeds you select per mailbox provider. Using too many seeds for any one provider may resemble spam-like behavior — particularly with providers where your mailbox has little to no prior engagement. For the most reliable and accurate test outcomes, we recommend that you balance seed usage across providers and avoid excessive volume to a single domain.

III. Auto Alias

1. Click the ‘Create New Test’ button.

2. Enter a unique test name.

Select the test type - Auto Alias
NOTE: If you are sending from Yahoo Mail, we recommend selecting the 'Sender email' or 'Unique Id' test type, since Yahoo does not support alias addresses.

Select the providers and their corresponding seed numbers for the test and click on Create Test

3. Copy the newly generated email addresses and add them to a new mailing list, or create a new campaign using your email service provider.

Important: Make sure to include the seed email "testid+vm2qywcxfayr@zbtest.org" in your test email. Failing to do so will result in missing test results.

4. Send your email to the list of provided email addresses.

Disclaimer:
Please be mindful of the number of seeds you select per mailbox provider. Using too many seeds for any one provider may resemble spam-like behavior — particularly with providers where your mailbox has little to no prior engagement. For the most reliable and accurate test outcomes, we recommend that you balance seed usage across providers and avoid excessive volume to a single domain.

Once the test email has been sent, our recipient inboxes begin the status reporting of your email message.

Note:

To ensure accurate results when running an Inbox Placement Testⓘ, we strongly recommend using realistic and verifiable email content. The message sent to our seed list should closely resemble your actual campaigns in terms of layout, tone, subject line, and overall structure. Avoid using placeholder text or test content, as this can trigger spam filters and skew the placement data.

The Email Server Testing Platform analyzes your email headers, according to best practices set by mailbox providers, to ensure that your mail server is setup and configured correctly This tool offers an incredibly detailed look into your mail server settings. Here, you’ll be able to diagnose any deliverability issues, and forward the results to your company’s postmaster. Follow the steps below to begin testing:

You’ll be presented with a randomly assigned email address. The address pictured is for illustrative purposes. Send an email to the address from the mail server that you want to test:

Once you send the email, please allow a few minutes for your results to appear. Below the test email, you’ll see the following table.

Example email address to sent to: Note: if you click on ‘generate new test email’, it will make the old address un-usable. If you have any email campaigns that send to the old address, you will need to update them.

This is where your file status will be displayed. For your convenience, we’ve added an auto-refresh feature. Typically, results will be available in a matter of minutes. However, longer wait times are possible.

View table of test reports

Once your results are available, the table will update and display the number of warnings and/or critical settings that your mail server settings have triggered. Next, click on ‘View Results’ to examine your report further.

Results Filters: Your results will be displayed on the following screen. If you're interested in filtering your results, simply select the appropriate checkbox at the top of the page, to update.

Once you’re presented with your results, you’ll have the ability to drill deeper into the data and identify potential issues in your mail server configuration that are keeping your emails from reaching their intended recipients. On the right side of the expanded results there is a blue printer button that allows you to save your results as a PDF. You can then forward the results to your postmaster.

Results screen

As part of our Deliverability Tools, our Blacklist Monitoring service will allow you to verify your status with over 200 different blacklists. And if your domain or IP is flagged, you’ll know which blacklisting company to contact about being delisted. You’ll be able to enter not only your domain (example.com), but also your IPv4 (123.123.123.123) and IPv6 (2001:db8::8a2e:370:7334) addresses. We recommend monitoring all your IP addresses that you use to send mail and domain names you send mail from, as this will provide greater monitoring success. All subscription levels, including Freemium, will have access to the Blacklist Monitoring service.

If you’re unsure of what your domain or mail server IP address is? Use Google’s free DNS tool here.

To set up a monitor navigate to the Blacklist Monitoring page in the member’s dashboard. When you’re ready to create a monitor begin by clicking on 'Add New Monitor'.

When setting up a monitor, you can also add a team member to send alerts to. This allows you to route your alerts to the proper team-member within your organization, or even outside vendors. If you haven’t done so when adding the monitor, you can also add it later using the Edit feature.

Add New Monitor window where set input the domain or IP and contact list for the monitor

Here you can proceed to enter the domain or IP address you wish to monitor. Then select which contact list should receive the alerts. If you haven’t created a contact list, you’ll be able to do so here. Finally, enter any notes you deem necessary.

When you’ve entered the proper information, click ‘Insert’ and your blacklist monitorⓘ is set up.

Depending on the level of your Deliverability Tools subscription, you’ll have a set number of monitors available to you. Also, your subscription level determines the frequency of which we check the domain or IP you’ve provided. Please see the table for a breakdown;

Custom plans also available.

If you’re unsure of how many monitors your account currently has available, that number is displayed just above the monitoring grid.

An active Blacklist Monitorⓘ

If you’d like to make changes to your monitoring settings, click the edit icon of the monitor you’d like to update. Once you do, you’ll be presented with a settings box. Here you can enable/disable the monitor status and alerts, as well as adding or removing notes.

If you’d like to toggle which blacklists are monitored, simply click on the arrow next to the domain or IP.

Arrow for Expanding Stats showing all the blacklists that have been scanned

Note: The number of blacklists we monitor changes, so be sure to include not only your domain but also your IPv4 and IPv6 addresses.

You’ll now be able to toggle which blacklists you’d like us to monitor, by default all are set initially to ON.

Our alert system will notify you when your domain or IP has been initially scanned, then, only if the status of your domain or IP address has changed, i.e. it was added to a blacklist or delisted from one. The number of backlists we check against will fluctuate. To ensure proper monitoring, please make sure to monitor your domain, IPv4 and IPv6 addresses.

Sample email our alert system will send

If you have any questions, or need assistance in setting up or modifying either your subscription level or blacklist monitor, please contact us.

1. Introduction

Our DMARC monitorⓘ tool is designed to help you effectively monitor and analyze DMARC(Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance) data for your domains. This documentation will cover detailed information and guidance on how to set up and how to use this tool to improve email security and authentication.

2. DMARC Basics

3. What are the benefits of using our DMARC Analyzer/Monitor Tool?

3.a Dmarc Record Configuration

• Simplifies the process of setting up and configuring DMARC records for your domains
• Provides a user-friendly interface to customize DMARC policies, alignment requirements and other options

3.b Reporting and Monitoring:

• Aggregates and processes DMARC reports received from email providers and generates actionable insights
• Presents DMARC data in a comprehensible dashboard and format

3.c Aggregate Reporting:

• Generates aggregate DMARC reports to summarize email authenticationⓘ results for a domain
• Helps domain owners understand the overall health of their email authenticationⓘ

3.d Forensic Reporting:

• Provides forensic-level DMARC reports for individual email messages that failed authentication

3.e Customization and Policies:

• Supports customization of DMARC policies to instruct email receivers on how to handle unauthenticated or failed emails(none, quarantine, reject)

3.f Historical Data and Trend Analysis:

• Maintains historical DMARC data, enabling trend analysis and performance monitoring over time

3.g User-Friendly Interface

• Provides a user-friendly and intuitive dashboard for users to view and analyze DMARC data
• Includes charts and visualizations for easy data interpretation

4. DMARC monitorⓘ - How to create the DMARC Record

Creating and customizing our DMARC Record for the Monitor/Analyzer tool is quite simple:

1. Head over to Tools -> DMARC monitor

2. Click on Add Domain

3. Add the domain you want to Monitor

4. Once we add the domain we’ll get our DMARC Record; this is where we can customize it by clicking on the Optional Settings button

5. Done customizing? Add the DMARC TXT record into your DNS registrar and proceed by clicking on the Verify DMARC record button

6. It may take up to 24 hours for your DMARC policy to take effect. We’ll send an email once we’ve verified it’s working correctly.

7. Your domain’s status will be “Verifying DMARC record…” until the DNS record propagates and the DMARC monitorⓘ gets synced.

Note: The DMARC monitorⓘ tool is live only after the Verifying DMARC record status is gone, any emails sent before or meanwhile it’s setting up will not be monitored by the tool. It does NOT monitor emails retrospectively, only from the time the tool is fully configured.

5. Pricing and Packages

Note: 1 DMARC monitor credit will be used only as long as the domain is being monitored/analyzed and is not deleted, after deletion the DMARC monitor Domain credit will be freed up and can be reused with another domain.

6. DMARC monitorⓘ dashboard, functionality and features

In our DMARC monitorⓘ dashboard we will find the following:

Domain = the domain monitored
Emails Reported = The number of emails reported for this domain
DMARC Compliance = The percentage of emails that successfully align with both SPF and DKIM
SPF = The SPF Alignment
DKIM = The DKIM Alignment
DMARC Policy = The DMARC Policy applied for the domain

To find out more about the DMARC reports/emails reported we’ll have to click on our domain which will forward us to the next dashboard, as seen in the screenshot below:

We can select the start and end date for which we want the statistics, we’ll get a count of the total emails reported and a count of the Monitored, Quarantined or Rejected emails(depending on our dmarc policy) and also a percentage of the DMARC complianceⓘ.

Scrolling down a bit further we’ll find our “Sources”

Sources = Email servers/recipient servers that have sent us dmarc reports.

Clicking on a specific domain, as in our case google.com will open a dashboard containing information only received by that particular domain.

IP’s in the screenshots are redacted for security reasons, the actual dashboard will shot the full IP(s).

Requests by country = This is determined by geolocating the sender IP’s used to send the emails for which we received the report(s). The Source IP field specifies the exact IP’s used to send the emails while also providing a count for the Emails Reported, a DMARC Compliance percentage, and our SPF and DKIM success rate.

To get even more information we can click on any of the Source IP’s and we will find:

Reporter: The domain that generated and sent the DMARC report to our RUA
Policy Overrides: A DMARC policy override occurs when an email recipient decides to override the policy that you have specified in your DMARC record. Additional information about Policy Overrides can be found here
From Domain: The domain used by the sender of the email( sender domain )
Return-Path Domain: Specifies the domain of the return-path. The return-path is an email header that tells SMTP servers where they should send non-delivery notifications(a.k.a bounces).
Policy applied: Monitored = a policy of none or no action was taken(emails that passed SPF and DKIM alignment)

Note: If the domain has a red-ish highlight as in the screenshot below, it means that the domain is NO longer set up for DMARC monitoring. Possible causes: the DMARC record generated by the tool was modified and the record wasn’t updated in your DNS registrar.

Warmup is a tool designed to help your emails reach the Inbox and avoid the Spam folder.

Complementing the Email Deliverabilityⓘ Toolkit, Warmup helps you build and maintain a strong sender reputation and ensure optimal email deliverabilityⓘ. You can leverage the Warmup service by subscribing to the Email Deliverabilityⓘ Toolkit at the ‘Team’ tier or higher.

How does Warmup work?

Warmup is like a friendly coach for your new or existing email address or domain. The email warmupⓘ tool gradually interacts with your outgoing emails by opening, clicking, favoriting, replying, etc. Warmup emulates authentic engagement through an automated process so that it appears legitimate to email service providers.

As you continue to build trust with providers through positive engagement, your emails are less likely to land in Spam and more likely to reach your recipients’ inboxes.

Benefits of using Warmup

How to use Warmup

This documentation is divided into two easy-to-follow parts:

Part I - How to set up and configure Warmup

You can use Warmup using one of two methods:

• Starting the AI Assistant Wizard
• Manually configuring the Warmup account

How to use the AI Assistant Wizard

By using the Warmup AI Assistant Wizard, we’ll walk you through the necessary steps to warm up your account for optimal email deliverabilityⓘ. You’ll receive a series of questions designed to help the Warmup AI Assistant recommend the best configuration for your Warmup account.

1. From your ZeroBounce dashboard, click on Tools. Then, click on Warmup.

2. Click on “+ New Warmup Account”.

3. From Set Up Your Warmup Account, choose Start the Wizard.

4. Set up your starting email count by selecting how many emails you send on a daily basis. Then, click Next.

The Wizard will ask you to estimate the number of emails you send daily, which is critical to ensure accuracy. Based on this information, the system will start the Warmup process by sending emails equivalent to approximately 0.1%* of your total daily email volume.

Why 0.1%? Major email service providers (ESPs) consider 0.1% as an acceptable threshold for negative engagement (such as emails being marked as spam). By starting with this small percentage, Warmup helps offset potential negative engagement with positive interactions, gradually improving your email reputation before scaling up further.

* The volume may differ based on your subscription, engagement rules, and our analysis of email reputationⓘ.

5. Choose the type of authentication method that you want to use.

6. Choose all email providers that are heavily marking your emails as spam and click on Next.

7. On the next step, choose how long your domain has been actively sending emails and click on Next.

8. In the next step, select the option that best reflects your current email deliverability and if there are any noticeable issues with the inbox placement. After selecting the best option, click on Next.

9. On the final step slide, you’ll be asked to select the option that best reflects the typical email engagement (open and click rates) and how frequently you send email campaigns. After selecting the best option, click on Submit.

10. Based on your choices from the wizard flow, the Warmup AI Assistant will generate a Summary Report that will highlight the best configuration approach for your Warmup account setup. You can inspect the chosen settings by the Warmup AI Assistant, and you may continue the setup with this configuration by selecting the Continue with these settings option. Alternatively, you can continue by manually configuring the Warmup account by selecting the Manually configure my warmup account option.

If you choose to continue the setup with the recommended settings by the Warmup AI Assistant, depending on the recommended authentication type, you’ll be prompted to continue with either Google OAuth, Outlook OAuth, SMTP, or the self-managed approach. We will use previously selected data from the Warmup AI Assistant Wizard to facilitate the next steps in setting up the Warmup account. Keep in mind that your consent is necessary, and the wizard will continue by checking the box on the consent form that acknowledges that ZeroBounce is authorized to send emails on your behalf to our seed list.

After the consent has been recorded, the final steps of the Warmup account setup will be reached.

1. Sender information (First and last name) will be required. After filling in the required information, click on Next Step >.

2. In the final step, you will need to set up your Advanced rules.

• Weekdays only - Toggle this to send emails only on weekdays. If untoggled, emails will be sent every day.
• Time zone - Choose the time zone for your business. This will help Warmup create realistic engagement patterns.
• Start the Warmup on - Choose the date on which Warmup should begin

3. Click on Save Settings, and the Warmup account will be successfully added!

Manually configuring the Warmup account

You can use Warmup using one of two methods:

• ZeroBounce managed - After connecting your account and creating your Warmup listing, ZeroBounce manages the Warmup process, from sending emails to processing them with automated engagement.
• Self managed - This method allows you to send emails yourself to our seed email addresses. We recommend this only for experienced users.

Please note:
ZeroBounce managed account is available exclusively for paid email accounts. Use of free email services is not permitted.

Manually configuring the Warmup account

1. From your ZeroBounce dashboard, click on Tools. Then, click on Warmup.

2. Click on “+ New Warmup Account”.

3. Click on “Manually configure my Warmup account”.

4. Choose “Let ZeroBounce manage the email sending”.

5. Choose one of the available connection options: Gmail/G-Suite, Microsoft 365/Outlook, or SMTP.

How to use Gmail/G-Suite with Warmup

1. Choose oAuth or App Password for your preferred authentication method.

Section 1a - Using oAuth authentication

1a. Login to your desired account and be redirected to the next step.

2a. Check the box on the consent form that acknowledges that ZeroBounce is authorized to send emails on your behalf to our seed list. Click continue.

3a. Continue on to configure your starting email count in Step 5.

Section 1b - Using a Google App Password

1b. Follow the on-screen prompt to generate an App Password. Then, click “I have created the App Password” to continue.

2b. Enter your email and App Password.

3b. Check the box on the consent form that acknowledges that ZeroBounce is authorized to send emails on your behalf to our seed list. Click Continue.

4b. Continue to configure your starting email count in Step 5.

How to use Microsoft Office 365/Outlook with Warmup

1. Log in to your Microsoft account and click ‘Next.’

2. Please check the box on the consent form acknowledging that ZeroBounce is authorized to send emails on your behalf to our seed list. Then click continue.

3. Continue to configure your starting email count in Step 5.

How to use SMTP with Warmup

1. Enter your SMTP email and click ‘Next.’

2. Enter your password, SMTP Host, and SMTP Port number in the corresponding fields. Click ‘Continue’.

3. Please check the box on the consent form acknowledging that ZeroBounce is authorized to send emails on your behalf to our seed list. Then click continue.

4. Continue to configure your starting email count in Step 5.

5. Set up your starting email count

The system will ask you to provide an estimate of the number of emails you send daily, which is critical to ensure accuracy. Based on this information, the system will start by sending emails equivalent to approximately 0.1%* of your total daily email volume. Why 0.1%? Major email service providers (ESPs) consider 0.1% as an acceptable threshold for negative engagement (such as emails being marked as spam). By starting with this small percentage, Warmup helps offset potential negative engagement with positive interactions, gradually improving your email reputation before scaling up further.

* The volume may differ based on your subscription, engagement rules and our analysis of email reputationⓘ.

6. Enter the required Sender Details (First and Last Name), and click ‘Next Step’.

7. Select your preferred engagement rules. Use the descriptions below to choose the most appropriate Warmup option:

Please note
It’s important to regularly adjust the engagement rules using our settings feature to align with your evolving preferences and requirements.

8. Set up your ‘Advanced Rules’.

• Weekdays only - Toggle this to send emails only on weekdays. If untoggled, emails will be sent every day.
• Time zone - Choose the time zone for your business. This will help Warmup create realistic engagement patterns.
• Start the Warmup on - Choose the date on which Warmup should begin.

Please note
It’s important to regularly adjust the engagement rules using our settings feature to align with your evolving preferences and requirements.

9. Click ‘Save Settings.’

How to use the self-managed method

1. From your ZeroBounce dashboard, click on Tools. Then, click on Warmup.

2. Click on “+ New Warmup Account”.

3. Click “I will manage the email sending myself”.

4. Add your sender information/email in the provided field.

5. Select your preferred engagement rules. Use the descriptions below to choose the most appropriate Warmup option:

Please note
It’s important to regularly adjust the engagement rules using our settings feature to align with your evolving preferences and requirements.

6. Verify your email address.

7. Please check the box on the consent form that acknowledges the mentioned best practices and that the ZeroBounce seeds might reply to the emails you send. Click continue.

8. Copy the provided list of seed email addresses.

9. Send your campaign or newsletter to these email addresses. After creating the campaign in your email delivery system, paste these addresses into the “To” field.

You should start by estimating the number of emails you send daily, as this is crucial for ensuring accuracy. Based on this estimate, you should initially send emails equivalent to approximately 0.1%* of your total daily volume. Why 0.1%? Major email service providers (ESPs) consider 0.1% as an acceptable threshold for negative engagement (such as emails being marked as spam). By starting with this small percentage, you can offset potential negative engagement with positive interactions, gradually improving your email reputation before increasing your email volume further.

Make sure you don’t send more emails than 1 per seed daily.

Warmup Permissions

When using ZeroBounce Managed, you grant us access to your mailboxes to send emails on your behalf. We strictly use these permissions for sending emails only — your emails are never read or accessed for any other purpose. Below is a breakdown of the permissions we request:

Part II - Warmup dashboard, functionality and features

Warmup dashboard overview

In your Warmup dashboard, you’ll find the following features and reporting metrics:

• Account - The monitored account.
• Type - Domain type.
• Inbox Score Overall - The score indicating the difference between the most recent email batch successfully delivered to the inbox and the initial batch sent.
• Emails Processed Today - The total number of emails sent and processed throughout the day.
• Today’s Inbox Emails - The number of emails processed today that successfully reached our inbox.
• Today’s Spam/Promo - The number of emails processed today that ended up in our Spam/Promotions folders.

Navigating the Statistics modal

To access your Warmup statistics:

1. Identify your Warmup account from the main dashboard.

2. On the far right, click the “...” button. Then, click ‘Statistics.’

The Statistics modal provides a comprehensive overview of all data collected since the initiation of your Warmup journey. You can customize how these statistics are displayed by using the dropdown menu pictured below.

Here’s a brief rundown of each Warmup statistic available:

• Overall Inbox Score - The overall percentage of emails that reach the inbox since the initiation of the Warmup service.
• Inbox Score Improvement - A percentage that indicates the overall increase of emails that have reached the inbox since beginning the Warmup service.
• Last Run Inbox Score - The percentage of emails that reached the inbox during the last batch of emails sent.
• Today’s Warmup Summary - This details the number of emails sent along with their corresponding final destination.
• All-Time Warmup Summary - Complete historical details on the number of emails sent with Warmup and their corresponding folder placement.
• Warmup Emails Processed - This graph illustrates the number of emails processed daily by Warmup and compares those delivered to the inbox to those delivered to the spam or promotions folders.
• SPF Results & Alignment - This indicates whether the emails you send are aligned with your current Sender Policy Framework (SPF) configuration.
• DKIM Results & Alignment - This indicates whether the emails you send are aligned with your DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) configuration.
• DMARC - Indicates whether your sent emails comply with the Domain-based Messaging, Authentication, and Conformance (DMARC) policy.

You can also use the Selector feature to update the selector used for your DMARC policy established with DMARC Monitorⓘ.

Navigating the Settings modal

1. Identify your Warmup account from the main dashboard.

2. On the far right, click the “...” button. Then, click ‘Settings’.

Here’s a brief rundown of what you can modify in the Settings modal:

• Sender information - You can locate the email address/account being used for this Warmup listing.

• Email Identifiers - You can filter the Warmup emails sent by ZeroBounce from all other emails by adding customer keywords here. Enter any keyword using alphanumeric characters.
  
  Ensure that you separate them with the separator selected below the field (e.g., OR Separated: keyword1 OR keyword2 OR keyword3).

• Engagement rules - This allows you to review and update your current engagement rules for the Warmup process. It’s recommended to review this regularly throughout your Warmup journey.

• Seeds - You can locate and copy your seed email addresses here at any time.

How to disable, enable, or delete a Warmup account

How to disable a Warmup account

If you want to disable or temporarily suspend the Warmup process for an account, follow these steps:

1. Locate a Warmup listing from your dashboard that’s currently enabled.

2. On the far right, click on the “...” button. Then, click ‘Disable’.

How to enable a Warmup account

If you want to re-enable a previously disabled Warmup account, follow these steps:

1. Locate a Warmup listing from your dashboard that’s currently disabled.

2. On the far right, click the button that reads ‘Enable Account.’

How to delete a Warmup account

If you want to delete a Warmup account, follow these steps:

1. Locate a Warmup listing from your dashboard.

2. On the far right, click the button that reads ‘Delete Account’.

Please note
Deleting a Warmup account will also delete all related history for that account permanently.

For additional Warmup assistance
Our customer support team is available 24/7. If you experience any issues with Warmup setup or have questions regarding how to use Warmup effectively, please contact the ZeroBounce team at any time.