What is an SPF record? (and why is it important to my cold email outreach program?)

What is an SPF record? (and why is it important to my cold email outreach program?) ????

SPF stands for (Sender Policy Framework)

Why is SPF important to companies using email (including cold email outreach)?

In short, SPF is actually rather simple - SPF helps to confirm you are, who you say you are.

Without it, you may not be who you say you are - so people might refuse to accept your emails - this is why it's important, get me?

And with the volume of phishing emails going round, SPF is a popular way of double checking.

So what actually is SPF?

It's not actually all that tough to set up an SPF record - in fact, it is done automatically in some cases.

An SPF record is a line of text that appears on your DNS record.  We don't need to get in to DNS records and what they are but let's say that in short, DNS records provide the internet with facts about your domain name (your website address).

To check to see if a domain has an SPF record I use SuperTool from mxtoolbox.com which you can see here.

Simply enter any domain name then hit SPF Record Lookup.  If for instance you enter "emailmovers.com" you will see that we have included salesforce and google in our SPF record.  This means that Salesforce and Google can both send emails on our behalf.

Now go and check your own domain and make sure you have a SPF record setup.

Does everyone need an SPF record?

Not necessarily, we require an SPF record because we use third parties such as Gmail to manage some of our emails and we use Salesforce as our CRM which we also use to send emails on ocassion.  As a result we need to add them to our SPF record.

How do I set up an SPF record?

It all depends on the domain manager you are using - if you were wanting to add google.com then complete the following steps - if you want to add a different domain just replace google.com with the domain you want to add (we use GoDaddy so the method below is specific to them but won't differ too much):

1. Log in to GoDaddy
2. Go to Manage Domains
3. Select the three dots next to the domain name
4. Choose "Manage DNS"
5. Select "Add" at the bottom of the page
6. Select TXT from the drop down
7. In the Type field leave as TXT
8. In the Host field enter "@"
9. In the TXT Value field enter "v=spf1 include:google.com ~all"
10. (If you want to add another service such as saleforce.com then add "include:salesforce.com" before the ~all)
11. Hit "Save"

The ~all command simply authorises any service used by salesforce.com.

Setting up an SPF

Why is SPF important for companies using Cold Email Outreach?

If you are using Cold Email Outreach to find new connections and build new relationships then you will likely be using a non-precious domain name connected to an email marketing solution.  If you do not have a valid SPF record authenticating your emails then your inbox placement will suffer and your emails may be more likely to end up in Spam.

I need more help with my SPF - who do I ask?

If you need more help then you have 3 options 1) Go to your webmaster 2) go to your domain management solution (such as GoDaddy)

I need more help with my Cold Email Outreach program - who do I ask?

If you need help with your Cold Email Outreach Program then give us a call on 08452267181 or use our livechat to talk with an expert now.

If you need help setting up a Cold Email Outreach Program yourself then you can also download our step by step guide from this page.

Good luck