Email Delivery Issues with Yahoo and Gmail

Many of you have been letting me know about email delivery issues you're experiencing such as bounced messages when emailing people with Yahoo, AOL, Verizon and Gmail accounts. Some are getting bounced return emails or other delivery messages. From the calls I am getting from clients, it's mostly users of Microsoft Exchange sending outbound emails to Yahoo/AOL/Gmail.

As of Feb 1, 2024, there was a change in authentication pushed by Yahoo and Gmail. The change required for better email delivery is called DMARC. I'm not an expert in DMARC/DKIM or SPF records but I support these issues the best I can. If I can't help, I have two referrals for you.

Here is how I explain it to my clients in simple terms...

When you bought your domain at GoDaddy/Network Solutions or whatever company, you have records that run that domain and those records have purposes. Some are for email delivery to your Microsoft Exchange or other email hosting account, some run your website address and some records have other functions. You also have email hosting, which that same company might be hosting your email if you have POP/IMAP and some also might host your website content. This may sound confusing, but either way you need to update some records, so the internet knows you are a real person, not a scammer and it validates your account."

If you have a domain-based email (.com or .net, .biz), you should just update these records either way. Email delivery is very important for every business. Also, your emails might be landing in people's junk or spam folder. Updating these records should help with hitting the inbox.

How to check to see if you need these record updates:

Type your domain in this page https://mxtoolbox.com/dmarc.aspx

If you see a green bar with v=DMARC1; p=none; and some other text, you might be ok. You should still test.

If you want to test sending me an email to my yahoo address, [email protected] I will reply. If you don't get a reply back from me, you should get a bounced email back. This will let you know if you need the records updated.

Typically, the record takes only a few minutes to update, but the propagation time can take 8 hours or more to complete.

How I can help

Schedule time on my calendar here --> Book an appt

If you are a prepaid client, select 30-min appt

If you are a new client, select 1-hour appt

Please have your domain registrar login username and password ready. This is usually where you bought your domain (GoDaddy, Network Solutions, HostGator, Wix, etc.)

I have the records to update that are "generic" and should be able to be used by everyone.

You might want to call your domain registrar first and see if they have the records to update. I have been finding that some are offering help to their customers. Or if you have another IT provider, you can call them and ask for help too.