Had an exchange of emails with someone, around 4-5 back and forth emails. He then told me that my last reply never arrived. When I forwarded that email again to him, he told me that actually the original reply arrived but landed in spam… he checked it after I forwarded the initial reply.
It’s not critical or even a super important conversation but I think he lied to me. Is there any chance that a reply lands in spam if the last 4 mails in a thread arrived without a problem?
The emails were sent from a custom domain, using Office 365 Business. I have that email address for more than 6 years and I never had a problem with my emails landing in spam or never arriving. It’s the first time I am hearing about it but I think he is duping me.
Edit Thanks all for the replies, it’s good to know that it can happen.
Wow! Thanks so much for the detailed response. I remember I tried mail-tester some time ago, I tried it now it gave me a 7.9/10
SpamAssassin. Score: -2.1.
-0.1 DKIM_SIGNED
Message has a DKIM or DK signature, not necessarily valid This rule is automatically applied if your email contains a DKIM signature but other positive rules will also be added if your DKIM signature is valid. See immediately below.
0.1 DKIM_VALID
Message has at least one valid DKIM or DK signature Great! Your signature is valid
-0.001 HTML_MESSAGE
HTML included in message No worry, that’s expected if you send HTML emails
-0.1 MIME_HTML_MOSTLY
Multipart message mostly text/html MIME
-1.985 PYZOR_CHECK
Similar message reported on Pyzor (https://www.pyzor.org) https://pyzor.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ Please test a real content, test Newsletters will always be flagged by Pyzor Adjust your message or request whitelisting (https://www.pyzor.org)
0.001 RCVD_IN_MSPIKE_H2
Average reputation (+2) xxxxx listed in wl.mailspike.net
0.001 SPF_HELO_PASS
SPF: HELO matches SPF record
0.001 SPF_PASS SPF
sender matches SPF record Great! Your SPF is valid
This is the other part of the test with yellow checkmarks.
You’re not fully authenticated
[SPF] Your server xx.xxx.xx.xx is authorized to use mail@xxxxx
Your DKIM signature is valid
You do not have a DMARC record You do not have a DMARC record, please add a TXT record to your domain _dmarc.xxxx with the following value: v=DMARC1; p=none
Your reverse DNS does not match with your sending domain.
The rest seems to be green except for the List-Unsubscribe header but I do not send newsletters.
My pleasure! I am somewhat versed so I’m happy to spread the knowledge where I can 😊 Microsoft does typically set up SPF and DKIM automatically for new accounts, but a small handful of my customers with legacy GoDaddy accounts that got switched to Office 365 found that it wasn’t enabled for them, for some reason. Probably a migration issue at GoDaddy.
Looks like it’s working just fine for your tenant though, and the rest of the test looks good. Pyzor would’ve triggered 'cause it was a short or empty test message - like the tester noted, test with real content to avoid that, but for now we can just ignore the ding, so you effectively have a 10/10. Nice 👌
It’s an unfortunate truth that there is no power on earth that can guarantee you stay out of the spam box. But, your domain and email are in good enough shape that you will pretty much always get delivered, even if sometimes that delivery is to Spam. You (or the person you were emailing) with might be able to harangue the receiving email provider into refactoring their sorting though; I’m sure your recipient doesn’t want their important emails going to spam, either!
Thanks so much! Well after a few days, I think that person lied to me and I don’t think anything landed in his spam. I think it was his way of getting out of something. Anyway should I also go ahead and do a DMARC record or is SPF and DKIM enough?
I’d recommend DMARC, sure - every little bit helps! But only because your SPF and DKIM are already aligned.
If you want me to check your work, shoot me a DM with your domain and I can take a look after you’ve done it with something like https://mxtoolbox.com (bookmark that one too, it’s good for checking your records after an edit to make sure the edit went live - just give it up to 72 hours). Or, a screenshot of the settings you’ve entered for the record, and I can validate for you (or mark it up to show changes if they’re needed).