What is DMARC?
DMARC stands for "Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance". It is an email-validation system designed to detect and prevent email spoofing (the act of making an email appear that it has come from a different address).
Every email provider has policies that determine whether an incoming message should be accepted or rejected. These policies help ensure inboxes are secure and free of spam. It also helps prevents your email from being used to send fraudulent emails and spam.
DMARC's primary rule is that you have to be who you say you are and send emails from email addresses that you own or are otherwise associated with you (for example, a mass email tool with which you have an account).
If sending emails to Gmail, Yahoo, or AOL accounts, you can only send from an account that is fully connected and authenticated. You cannot send emails to Gmail, Yahoo, or AOL accounts using an alias.
How to ensure you can send email via Contactually
DMARC impacts not only individual email accounts but also applications such as Contactually that connect to your email and let you send messages.
To ensure your messages are always sent from your email address, make sure your email account is authenticated in Contactually. There are two ways to ensure this: make sure your email is connected in Contactually, and don't go over the bulk email limit for your Contactually plan.
Make sure your email is connected
Your email must be connected. You can check this in your Contactually Settings on the Email page. A connected email will show a green checkmark underneath with a message indicating that the email account was recently checked.
If your email has disconnected, there will be a red triangle underneath the email account. Click Update Credentials next to your email and reenter your credentials. The most common issue is that your password was changed but not updated in Contactually.
Occasionally, the issue has nothing to do with your email account's credentials and instead stems from a problem with your email server. In this case, contact your IT administrator.
Don't go over your bulk email limit
Each Contactually plan has a bulk email limit. The limit does not apply to individual Follow-Ups or Program emails that are manually approved. The limit only applies to ScaleMail and Program emails sent out automatically.
Once the daily limit has been reached, you won't be able to send any more ScaleMails or Program-triggered emails that do not require approval. If you find that you are trying to work around this limit, please consider a marketing platform designed to help you send email at this scale—Contactually even integrates with MailChimp, while others can be connected through Zapier.
In addition to Contactually's bulk email limits, each email provider has its own send limit. This has nothing to do with Contactually and applies to all types of emails, individual or bulk, and includes emails sent both from applications such as Contactually and your regular email inbox. It will trigger whatever action your email provider has put in place. In some cases this is simply a label on messages, such as "[SPAM]," and in other cases you receive a notice that your email is being temporarily shut down. If you've exceeded your email provider's send limit, contact your provider directly.
You can find most email providers' limits by running an internet search.
What happens if my email account fails the authentication check?
If your email account fails the authentication check when sending from Contactually, Contactually can't send messages from your email address.
To ensure your messages get sent, Contactually uses a third party, SendGrid, and sends from the email address [your email username]-[your email domain]@email.contactually.com. For example, if your email is Jane@MyBusiness.com, the SendGrid email would be Jane-MyBusiness@email.contactually.com. This is a temporary email address.
Any responses to messages sent via SendGrid will be directed to your regular email account's inbox.