Important Announcement regarding your outbound email correspondence!
On April 25th GoMax Solutions will be adopting a new industry wide protocol in sending email that now requires all senders to use a verified domain name. This critical change has caused quite a stir within the technical communities throughout the internet as any company that transmit emails on behalf of their clients can no longer simply send these emails out unless a verified domain name is used within the “From” line in the email itself.
REMINDER! GoMax Solutions will be adopting a new industry wide protocol in sending email that now requires all senders to use a verified domain name on April 25th. This critical change has caused some confusion and panic with some users…
Why is this happening?
Let’s face it, no one likes Spam email and we all wish it would go away. The real spammers on the internet like to remain hidden and prefer to not have tracks back to their location. The requirement for sending using a verified domain will help ensure legitimacy in the emails sent from the domain and should put a dent into the activities of these Spammers. Although the usage of SPF and DKIM for domain verification is not new, previously it hasn’t been widely used, it is only now that the large Transactional email providers are fully incorporating this requirement.
GoMax Solutions currently uses the Mandrill platform for Transactional email, and it was Mandrill who set the date of April 27th as the final deadline to use verified sender domains. Any email sent after this date from a non-verified domain will not be delivered. We chose April 25th to be a couple days ahead of the curve. We will also be implementing Sparkpost Transactional Email as another delivery platform.
How this impacts you?
Last week we advised that unless you are able to execute the verification requirements and apply specific DNS settings to your domain name (IE: the @domainname.com portion of your email address) then all future emails will be sent using our verified domain (_yourname_@secure-email.ca). Please note that if a recipient clicks reply to an email you sent, this will still work properly as the ‘reply-to’ address will be yours and the reply will come back to you.
All emails that originate from the GoMax inTouch system (Projects, Action Plans, Events, NRA, etc.) will be sent using the settings “From: Your_Name@secure-email.ca” & “Reply-To: youremail@yourdomain.com”. As you can see in the “From” address, it is our verified domain that has to used in order to send the email out. Yes it is possible to have the “From” address use your own email address, however this requires domain verification using SPF and DKIM records applied to your DNS.
What do you need to do from here?
You have 2 choices:
1) continue as normal and see how things work out using our verified domain as explained above (_yourname_@secure-email.ca). We feel that for most people this will work just fine, particularly those who will be unable to get their parent corporations to perform the required verification steps with the SPF and DKIM DNS settings.
2) go through the process to get verified. If you are in control and have registered your own domain name, this will be fairly easy to accomplish. However, if you use an email address provided by another company such as @gmail.com, @outlook.com, @shaw.ca, @telus.net, this simply will not be possible. If you have an email address provided by your parent corporation, you will have to check with them to see if they will cooperate and apply the required DNS settings to get verified.
Should you choose to try and get verified, please contact our support department by submitting a ticket and further instructions will be sent to you.
GMAIL, SHAW, TELUS ETC USERS:
Have you considered a personal domain name?
If you are using an email address provided by your ISP, such as @shaw.ca, @gmail.ca, @telus.net, etc. then you should consider a personal domain name. This will allow you to brand yourself properly without promoting your ISP in the process. A personal domain name more importantly allows you to purchase an email account that uses this domain name and will then facilitate the ability to become verified properly for sending email.
For example, if your name was John Doe, and you were currently using an email address of johndoe@gmail.com, it would be impossible to verify the @gmail.com for sending purposes. Plus you are advertising for Gmail instead of yourself every time you hand out your email address.
Now if you were to register a personal domain name of www.doemortgages.com (example only – this domain may not actually be available), and you purchased the email account of john@doemortgages.com, sender verification would be possible. Plus every time you tell someone your email address it is now promoting your own personal domain name. This is a perfect opportunity to build your own brand awareness.
For more information regarding obtaining a personal domain name and/or email accounts on your domain name please submit a support ticket.
