What does it mean?
This article expands on the information shown in the TourCMS Email Health page. It explains what SPF and DMARC DNS records are and how to configure them so that emails sent via TourCMS (and its provider Sendgrid) are delivered reliably.
To understand where this information appears in TourCMS, see What is the ‘Email health’ page.
What should I do?
What is an SPF Record?
An SPF (Sender Policy Framework) record is a specially formatted DNS entry that tells email providers which email servers you have permitted to send emails to on your behalf. Increasingly, email providers are checking for an SPF record and verifying that the sending server is on the allowed list before delivering mail to their users.
In the same way, an “A” DNS record tells web browsers which web server to send a customer to when they click a link to http://www.example.com, and an “SPF” DNS record speaks to email providers which email servers to accept email from @example.com. A lack of an SPF record, or an SPF record, can result in mail not reaching the recipient's mailbox.
You can use a tool like MXToobox to check if you have an SPF record already:
SPF Check & SPF Lookup - Sender Policy Framework (SPF) - MxToolBox
Note: Providers like Yahoo and Gmail now effectively require DMARC for reliable delivery and spam protection.
If you already have an SPF record
Find the existing SPF DNS record in your DNS provider site/app and add sendgrid.net to the list of allowed servers.
For example, if your current SPF record looks like this:
v=spf1 include:example.com -all
You would add an included entry for sendgrid.net (TourCMS' email provider) like so:
v=spf1 include:example.com include:sendgrid.net -all
If you do not already have an SPF record
You will need to go to the web interface of your DNS provider and create a new DNS entry of type TXT (or "“Text" ”) with the following format:
v=spf1 include:sendgrid.net -all
Take care to include any other servers your company uses to deliver email on the domain. Most services your business uses to send email will have a help page or other; otherwise, be able to advise what to place in your SPF record to allow them to continue sending on your behalf.
For example, if your company primarily uses Gmail to send emails, your new SPF entry could look something like this:
v=spf1 include:_spf.google.com include:sendgrid.net ~all
You can use an online tool to validate your SPF record:
SPF Check & SPF Lookup - Sender Policy Framework (SPF) - MxToolBox
SPF Checker & Lookup Tool | EasyDMARC
What is a DMARC Record?
A DMARC record is a specially formatted DNS entry that tells email providers what to do if they receive an email sent by a server that doesn't pass SPF and/or DKIM checks.
If you send over 5,000 emails per day from your domain (across any email service), it may be beneficial to configure a DMARC record. However, suppose you forward email via mailing lists. In that case, this can cause deliverability issues if you do not also have DKIM configured on your sending server (talk to the provider of the email service you use to send to mailing lists in this case).