What this message means and why it happens
If you're seeing this message, you have an email reputation problem — too many people have been marking your emails as spam:
Lots of messages from [yourdomain.com] were identified as spam in the past
When your domain gets flagged like this, your sender reputation is in the danger zone and needs immediate attention. The first steps are the same either way: clean up your contact list by removing invalid and unresponsive addresses, and review your sending habits.
Gmail's spam filters can flag your emails for a range of reasons — things like deceptive subject lines, spammy wording, poor DNS records setup, or sending to invalid addresses.
How to resolve
Stop sending emails from the affected mailbox in your automation tool
Add all mailboxes under this domain to Folderly to make sure they receive positive engagement
Wait until the Folderly score is back to 90+ for your mailbox
Resume email campaigns for your mailbox in the automation tool
Best Practices
There is a list of best practices to follow to prevent this or similar issues in the future. The specific steps depend on whether you do email marketing or cold outreach. These are two different practices with different rules. Here you can find the difference between them.
Email marketing
Make it easy to opt out
Always tell recipients how to unsubscribe, even if it's just a simple line like "Let me know if you'd like to be removed from this list." People are often too busy or too embarrassed to ask, so they click "This is Spam" instead. Every time that happens, your reputation drops, and Gmail learns to send your messages straight to the spam folder. Letting them know it's okay to opt out encourages many of them to do the better thing and simply ask.
Watch your content
Skip the hype — no excessive exclamation marks or phrases like "You must read this" or "Don't miss out"
Don't use common spam words
Don't hide links behind tiny images or use white text on a white background
Avoid emails that are mostly images
Leave out emojis
Avoid long links and shortened links
Keep your signature simple — don't overload it with images, phone numbers, or GIFs
Keep your list clean
Remove bouncing addresses right away; repeatedly emailing dead accounts hurts your reputation
Validate your lead lists before sending
Get the technical setup right
Stay within your sending limits
Keep your DNS records clean and properly configured
Cold outreach
Set up a dedicated domain and mailbox
Use a domain reserved specifically for cold outreach — sending outreach from your main domain can damage its reputation
Make your mailbox name human, not generic — use anna@folderly.com rather than sales@folderly.com or info@folderly.com
Keep your DNS records properly configured
Mind your lead lists
Send only to valid mailboxes
Upload any "catch-all" mailboxes to a separate sequence
Keep your content plain
Use plain text, not HTML
Avoid spammy words like "$", "free", "trial", or "proposal"
Leave links, images, videos, GIFs, emojis, PDFs, attachments, and bold text out of the body, signature, and subject line
You can add any of those after a prospect replies — just not in the first message
Skip the unsubscribe link
For cold outreach, we don't recommend including an unsubscribe link
Have questions? Drop us a message in the chat.