Email deliverability
Email deliverability is whether the messages you send actually reach the recipient's inbox rather than their spam folder or nowhere at all. For link-building outreach it is the constraint that decides whether any of the work is seen.
Also called: sender reputation, inbox placement, mailbox warm-up, SPF DKIM DMARC
It is governed largely by sender reputation, which mailbox providers build from how recipients treat your mail: opens and replies help, spam complaints and deletions without reading hurt, and messages to addresses that do not exist hurt considerably. Reputation attaches to both your sending domain and your IP, and it is slow to build and quick to damage.
Three DNS records are table stakes: SPF, which lists who may send for your domain; DKIM, which cryptographically signs your mail; and DMARC, which tells providers what to do when the first two fail. Since 2024 Google and Yahoo have required all three from bulk senders, and mail without them is increasingly not delivered at all.
For outreach specifically, two operational habits matter more than any tool. Warm up a new mailbox by ramping volume gradually over weeks rather than sending at full rate immediately, and keep volumes low enough that replies remain a meaningful share of sends — because a program whose reply rate collapses is destroying the asset it depends on, and a burned domain is not quickly recoverable.
Common questions
Should link-building outreach send from my own domain?
Sending from your real domain and mailbox is what makes outreach credible to a recipient, and it is how Outlink AI works — over OAuth, from your own Gmail or Outlook. The tradeoff is that your primary domain's reputation is genuinely at stake, which is why volume caps and warm-up limits matter rather than being optional settings.
Related terms
Link building
Link building is the practice of getting other websites to link to yours, because search engines treat a link from one site to another as a signal that the destination is worth showing to searchers.
Digital PR
Digital PR is public relations run with search visibility as an explicit goal: earning coverage, citations, and links in online publications rather than pursuing print or broadcast placement for brand awareness alone.
Last reviewed 2026-07-30. All glossary terms
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