Have you ever tried to open an account on MailChimp, SendinBlue, Mailjet, MailUp, PepiPost, ConstantContact, VerticalResponse, AWeber or other ESPs, but they refuse to accept you as a customer? Yes, this sometimes happens. When you open an account on ESPs, they will ask you some questions about your email marketing experiences, your list, and your current sending infrastructure. Here is one sample of question you may get asked:
- How many total subscribers are on your list?
- What is the process of email collection?
- How many times per month would you like to send?
- How were you sending emails to your list?
- What kind of emails are you planning to send? Please share some sample content of the emails.
Once you answer these questions, ESPs will analyze your results and check your current sending reputation. If you have not a good history in your sending behavior, they may reject your application. In such a case, they refuse to tell you why exactly they refused you. Here is one example letter they send to you in you get rejected on SendinBlue:
Each account is reviewed by our new accounts team before campaigns can be sent out. We do this to ensure new accounts comply with our terms of service, and that new users are in a position to be successful using SendinBlue. After reviewing your account, unfortunately, we will not be able to validate your account.
While I understand that this is likely very frustrating to hear, your account was declined because it failed proprietary analyses we use on all new accounts. I am sorry to have to give a vague answer, but the secrecy of the processes we use in analyzing new accounts is absolutely vital to maintaining its efficacy.
What I can tell you is that the analyses look at a number of publicly available data points that relate to domain/DNS history and contact email addresses. IP history is also analyzed, but is very, very rarely a cause for declining an account. I am prevented from divulging specifics, but can confirm that most -- though not all -- prospective users who fail these analyses seem to be aware of something that could have caused them to fail.
We really wish we could work together but unfortunately, your account doesn't comply with our terms and conditions due to which it won't be possible for us to work together.
We apologize for the inconvenience. Thank you for trying our service and we wish you the best.
Here is the rejection letter you may get from Mailjet provisioning team:
Our Compliance team has taken the time to review the information you sent over, and has reviewed your account. Unfortunately we’re not able to grant you access to Mailjet services at this time because of some parameters and previous practices which are not compliant with our Sending Policy.
As you can see, in both cases, they refuse to share more information about the exact reason why they do not accept you. In this article, we try to review some reasons which are the cause of such a decision.
These reasons are gathered with deep experience of email marketing and are not published by any of ESPs. If you have any other idea which is the cause of rejection and are not covered through this article, please share us in comments.
Why ESPs Reject Me as a New Customer?
1. History of Your Domain
Email service providers hate spammers. Their first aim is to keep spammers away from their infrastructure. Couple of years ago, there was not such audits after registrations. But the attacks of spammers have learned the ESPs to build new rules while accepting the customers. The first thing they check is the history of your domain. Have you sent emails to purchased lists so far? If so, there is no chance for you to get approved. They easily can track your historical background. There are some public tools that you can check your domain history with that. For example, take a look at https://www.senderscore.org. So, if you have sent one or more email campaigns to a purchased list (unsolicited emails), you have found the reason. Keep in mind that building a good reputation is easier than fixing a damaged reputation. If you have done that, you must stop sending unsolicited emails now and send your request again 1 year later.
Sending unsolicited emails is not the only reason which damages your reputation. If your email list contains bad emails such as bounced, invalid, disposable, spam-traps and more, you may get rejected. So start cleaning your current database and get rid of bad emails, since once your list is not 100% healthy, you will never build a good reputation.
2. History of Your Website IP
Just like the history of your domain, the history of your website IP is important. There is one more thing you may consider and it is if you are on a shared IP address (a hosting). If another website on a shared hosting sends unsolicited emails, your website IP also will lose its reputation. Having a dedicated IP does not need much budget. So, consider buying a dedicated IP an try to register your desired ESP again a couple of months later. You may use MxToolbox to check if your website IP is blacklisted. If your IP is on the list, so this is the point you must fix before applying again on ESPs.
3. Your Domain Age
Do not behave like spammers. Most spammers buy a domain and start sending marketing emails. No website with domain age of 1 month has a list of 1K subscribers or more. So, if your domain is new, do not try to open an account on ESPs. Try to build a reputation for your domain on 3 or 4 months and try to apply again.
4. Your Website Content and Structure
ESPs analyses your website. It must have enough content and MUST include a newsletter sign up forms (newsletter sign up, registration forms, etc.) with the consent of receiving newsletters. Without having such forms, how you possibly obtained 1K or 100K email addresses? Prior to signing up on an ESP, prepare enough evidence on your website. Your website must have a double-opt-in method while collecting email addresses.
5. The Less Transactional Email was Sent With Your Domain/IP
How did you collect your email list without sending transactional signup or welcome emails? If you have not sent a considerable amount of transactional emails, consider building a good reputation by sending transactional emails using your own IP. If your emails land in the spam folder, do not panic, ask your users to press the "Not Spam" button. Your emails will land in the Inbox folder after 1 or 2 months. Believe me.
6. Answer the Questions Honestly and Accurately
Your answer to their question is also important. Most possibly, the already knew the answer to those questions. They do not need a liar customer. Since he/she can ruin the reputation of their IPs in the near future. So, write an answer to the questions thoroughly and honestly. If you already know weaknesses in your domain or IP reputation, just mention that and say that you will try not to do them again.
Final Words
Lastly, if you are rejected with one of those ESPs, do not try another one before solving these problems. Their checklist has the same parameters in most cases. So, there is a high chance of rejection if you apply for another ESP again. Start building a good reputation by sending only transactional emails from your domain and IP, then request for a bulk email marketing account. It is highly recommended to validate your emails just before sending any email to build an stronger sending score and reputation. A good reputation is not built in one week or month. But after six months, you certainly have a very good sending reputation.
