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[lukewd]

Hi there, we are a commercial ESP sending emails on behalf of clients.

I know inbox placement rate is largely determined by the reputation of the sending IP? But I would like to know if there are other factors which may transfer that reputation (positive or negative) from one pool of IP's to another.

Now we obviously have different types of clients with different open/click/unsubscribe/bounce rates.  We are never going to be able to control that 100%. However we want to pool the best performing clients with other good performing clients, and offer the high volume clients dedicated IP's to send from.  This seems pretty normal practice.

My question is, how separate do you have to keep these pools of IP's to make sure the negative reputation from one pool, won't bring down the high reputation from another?

Specifically I would like to know if you think:
Each pool/IP needs to be registered on a separate FBL address?
Do they need completely different domains the hostname/rDNS?
Do they need different DKIM signatures?
Different domain in the Return-path: header (used for VERP bounce handling)
Different domain in the Sender: header (used for authentication)
Etc. etc.

I understand yahoo require a DKIM signature for FBL complaints. So I would assume reputation is carried across domains with the for sure. However, what about gmail and Hotmail?

[lukewd]

I'm surprised no one has any opinion on this? Is it something most wouldn't even bother considering?

[daniel]

I think no-one has real answers and wonders the same questions. The only people who know probably work at each ISP. I'm not sure there is anyone in the world who knows the answers to all your questions.

[lukewd]

true thanks for your input. 

has anyone got experience with return-path? is this the sort of "insider information" they might be able to provide for their $25k fees?

[CaLViN]

Do you mean Return Path ? It is only useful for yahoo,aol,comcast and hotmail.

[lukewd]

Hi yes i meant Return Path (i was in a rush and force of habit typing return-path)...

Is this the type of advice they would be able to offer? Is there anyone in the industry that has the answers to my questions?

[CaLViN]

Hi,
Yes pooling the best customers with some other best customers would help you.
There are different strategies on how to pool them,warmup and then dedicate them.

Here are some experiences :


Each pool/IP needs to be registered on a separate FBL address?   Tried that on different providers like yahoo hotmail and didnt see any difference.They dont check FBL.
Do they need completely different domains the hostname/rDNS?     This is yes.You might setup new customers on a seperate domain to see if they are good or bad guys.Then you can transfer them to your warmed-up reputable ips/domains.

Do they need different DKIM signatures? I dont think this matters.
Different domain in the Return-path: header (used for VERP bounce handling) Sure,if you change the mail from then you should change this,too.I have seen blocked mailfroms,domains,returnpaths.

Different domain in the Sender: header (used for authentication) Yes.

[lukewd]

Hi Calvin, Thanks a lot for your insight, really appreciate your experience on this.

Would you go as far as making sure there is different registration information on the Whois info for the different domains?
And also different WHOIS information on each pool of IP's?

Or is that over kill?

[CaLViN]

Well,when the things went wrong,i did the same thing.Setup a completely seperate/unique environment.
But did not work.

[lukewd]

Oh, it didn't work? how could it not have worked?

How unique/separate did you go?  Everything I have listed above?

[CaLViN]

I mean changing whois addresses wont work.
Afaik,no ISP checks that.

[lukewd]

Great thanks for your input Calvin. So I suppose to summarise, if you are creating separate IP pools for keeping reputation separate...

The following are important to keep completely different:

• IP addresses
• Domains (sender, return-path, mailfrom, hostname, etc).

Are not important (can be the same):

• Whois information
• FBL address assigned to that IP (they can be the same)

[Teneo]

Do you mean Return Path ? It is only useful for yahoo,aol,comcast and hotmail.

Although this is certainly true for those ISP's , I would not state it is ONLY useful for these ISP's.
For some of our customers we need to send heavily to CloudMark protected ISP's, and RP certification has a huge impact here.

Also for some other domains in the BeNeLux .

But as far as the major ISP's , yes , correct.

[KentM]

If your reputation is good enough to get Return Path Certified you aren't going to have to worry about any ISPs regardless of who they are.

Kent

[Teneo]

If your reputation is good enough to get Return Path Certified you aren't going to have to worry about any ISPs regardless of who they are.

Kent

Not entirely true. Return Path isn't just about getting to the inbox. It's about getting their FAST sometimes.
And with fast I mean FAST. Unlimited mails/sec , connections/sec , throttling in general.

Also it's about monitoring delivery, about accessing delivery data that you can't get without RP ...

(no affiliations whatsoever with Return PAth Inc.)