How to Improve WordPress Email Deliverability with SendGrid

Is Your WordPress Site Struggling to Reach the Inbox? How SendGrid Can Help Boost Email Deliverability

Hey there, WordPress user!

If you‘ve noticed your emails aren‘t making it to recipients‘ inboxes, you‘re not alone. According to a study by Return Path, nearly 1 in 5 emails worldwide fails to reach the inbox. For WordPress sites in particular, subpar server configurations and sending practices often result in important transactional emails like password resets, order notifications, and contact form submissions being flagged as spam or going undelivered entirely.

The good news is there‘s a straightforward solution to this frustrating problem: offloading your email sending to a dedicated service like SendGrid. By routing your WordPress emails through SendGrid‘s robust infrastructure purpose-built for high deliverability, you can finally say goodbye to the spam folder and ensure your emails get to where they need to go.

Why Your Web Host Struggles with Email Delivery

Most web hosting providers don‘t prioritize email infrastructure, leading to a host of potential issues:

• Lack of proper email authentication (SPF, DKIM, DMARC)
• Low-quality shared IP addresses with poor reputation
• Absence of feedback loops to handle unsubscribes and spam complaints
• Limited support for high-volume sending

As Eric Blumenthal, VP of Product Management at SendGrid explains:

"Email delivery is really complex. There are hundreds of potential points of failure between when a sender hits send and when the recipient opens the email. The majority of hosting providers simply can‘t make the investment required to build and maintain an email infrastructure that can adapt to continually evolving deliverability criteria."

How SendGrid Improves WordPress Email Deliverability

SendGrid is an industry-leading email delivery service that powers the email sending of over 80,000 businesses. Their globally distributed infrastructure and relentless focus on deliverability enables them to maintain stellar sender reputations and achieve high inbox placement rates.

Key to SendGrid‘s impressive delivery rates include:

• Optimized email authentication (SPF, DKIM, DMARC)
• Dedicated IP addresses to isolate your reputation
• Proactive ISP relations to fast-track resolution of any deliverability hiccups
• Built-in spam filter testing to identify issues before sending
• Granular email analytics to track performance

These technical elements are paired with hands-on deliverability expertise in the form of consultation, monitoring, and access to a community of email experts.

Setting Up SendGrid for Your WordPress Site in 4 Steps

Now that you know why you should consider outsourcing your WordPress email delivery, let‘s dive into exactly how to get SendGrid working on your site.

Step 1: Create Your SendGrid Account

First, head to SendGrid.com and sign up for an account. SendGrid offers a free plan that allows you to send up to 100 emails per day forever. If you need more volume, paid plans start at $15/month for up to 40,000 emails.

As part of the signup process, you‘ll be guided through authenticating your domain. This involves adding a few DNS records to verify domain ownership and enable sending. The process differs slightly based on your DNS provider, but SendGrid provides customized step-by-step instructions for all the major players.

Step 2: Install & Activate the SendGrid WordPress Plugin

In your WordPress dashboard, navigate to Plugins > Add New. Search for "SendGrid", install the official plugin by SendGrid, and activate it on your site.

Step 3: Configure Your SendGrid Settings

After activation, go to Settings > SendGrid to enter your API key and configure your sending settings.

To create an API key:

1. Log in to your SendGrid account and go to Settings > API Keys
2. Click "Create API Key"
3. Give your key a name and select "Restricted Access"
4. Under "Mail Send", check "Mail Send" and save the API key
5. Copy the generated API key

Paste your API key into the WordPress SendGrid settings, then scroll down to the Mail section. Here you‘ll enter the default From Name and From Email you want to use for sending.

You‘ll also choose whether to send via SMTP or API. For most users, the API method is recommended as it‘s more secure and efficient. If you opt for SMTP, you‘ll need to install an SMTP plugin and configure encryption.

Click Save and you‘re good to go! Your WordPress emails will now be routed through SendGrid.

Step 4: Test Your SendGrid Integration

Before you celebrate, it‘s a good idea to send a quick test email to confirm everything is working properly. An easy way to do this is to submit a comment or contact form on your site.

Check your email for the test message. If it arrives successfully in the inbox (not spam) with your specified From Name and Email, you can start enjoying SendGrid‘s superpowers!

5 Tips for Improving WordPress Email Deliverability with SendGrid

While SendGrid provides an immediate and significant boost to deliverability out of the box, there are a few extra steps you can take to reach even more inboxes and delight your recipients.

1. Complete Your Domain Authentication

Properly authenticating your domain is crucial for establishing trust and sender reputationwith inbox providers. During the setup process you should have added the SPF and DKIM records provided by SendGrid, but confirm these records are in place by testing your authentication.

2. Ramp Up Your Sending Gradually

When you‘re first starting out with a new domain or dedicated IP, it‘s best to slowly scale your sending volume over several weeks. This warmup period allows you to establish a good sending reputation and avoid triggering spam filters with sudden high volumes.

Begin by sending to your most engaged recipients, then increase quantities by about 30% each week until you reach your desired volume.

3. Keep a Clean Email List

Monitoring your email analytics for signs of poor engagement is key to maximizing your sender reputation. Proactively remove invalid emails, bounces, and unsubscribes to signal to inbox providers that you‘re a trustworthy sender.

It‘s also a good idea to periodically remove unengaged subscribers who haven‘t opened a certain number of emails over a period of time, as continued sending to these recipients can negatively impact deliverability.

4. Follow Email Content Best Practices

Certain types of content are more likely to raise red flags with spam filters. To minimize your risk of emails being marked as spam, follow these content best practices:

• Avoid using all caps, especially in the subject line
• Limit use of exclamation points and other special characters
• Don‘t include URL shorteners
• Balance text and images, avoiding image-only emails
• Provide an unsubscribe link in each email

Before sending, you can also run your content through SendGrid‘s spam filter testing to get a spam score and recommendations for improvement.

5. Choose the Right SendGrid Plan for Your Needs

SendGrid offers several pricing tiers based on monthly email volume and feature needs:

While the free plan is a great way to get started, as your WordPress site grows you‘ll likely want to upgrade to a paid plan for increased volume and premium features like dedicated IP addresses, subuser management, and access to deliverability experts.

Taking Your WordPress Email to the Next Level

Email remains a critical communication channel for WordPress sites of all stripes. But for messages to drive results, they first need to reach the inbox. By leveraging SendGrid‘s powerful email delivery infrastructure, you can overcome the deliverability pitfalls common to WordPress sites and ensure your emails get where they need to go.

While we‘ve focused on SendGrid as our recommended email provider, alternatives like Mailgun, Postmark, or SparkPost are also solid options. Selecting the right provider comes down to evaluating your specific needs and choosing the features and pricing that best align.

No matter which provider you choose, outsourcing your WordPress email is a no-brainer for keeping your sender reputation squeaky clean and your emails out of spam oblivion.

If you‘re experiencing email issues, give SendGrid a try! With just a few minutes of setup, you‘ll be well on your way to building positive relationships with inbox providers, delighting subscribers, and getting your emails to eager recipients every time.