We auto-configure SPF, DKIM, and DMARC on your sending domain. We warm new senders gradually (10 → 30 → 60 → 100/day across week one). We cap volume per inbox, throttle send pacing, suppress bounces in 24 hours, and run live spam-content lint against every pitch. The 95th-percentile deliverability of pitches sent through Pitch2Retail is around 96%.
Why deliverability matters
Spam folder placement is silent. There's no error. The pitch shows as "delivered" in your dashboard but the buyer never sees it. Worse: enough spam-folder placement teaches Gmail / Microsoft 365 that your domain is a spammer, and even your transactional emails (order confirmations, shipping updates, invoices) start landing in spam.
For B2B retail outreach, the cost of poor deliverability is concrete:
- Wholesale order delays of 4-12 weeks (typical buyer follow-up cycles)
- Lost shelf placement opportunities (a buyer who never saw the pitch can't say yes)
- Domain-level reputation damage that takes 30-90 days to recover
- Risk of being added to ISP shared blocklists (Spamhaus, Barracuda, SORBS)
SPF, DKIM, DMARC — the trust trifecta
Modern inbox providers (Gmail, Microsoft 365, Yahoo) require all three. Without them, your mail goes straight to spam — or gets rejected entirely.
| Record | What it does | Pitch2Retail handles |
|---|---|---|
| SPF | Authorizes which IPs may send "from" your domain | We give you the exact TXT record to add. Validates within 1 hour. |
| DKIM | Cryptographically signs each message — proves it wasn't tampered in transit | Auto-provisioned via Resend. We rotate keys every 90 days. |
| DMARC | Tells inbox providers what to do if SPF or DKIM fails | We recommend p=quarantine at start, escalating to p=reject after 30 days clean. |
Gmail and Yahoo's February 2024 sender requirements made all three mandatory for any sender doing more than 5,000 messages/day to their inboxes. Microsoft 365 followed in 2025. Pitch2Retail enforces them at onboarding — you literally cannot send your first batch until all three records validate green.
Sender warm-up
A brand-new sending domain has zero reputation. Sending 500 messages on day one from a cold domain is the fastest way to get blacklisted. We schedule a gradual ramp:
| Week | Daily cap | What changes |
|---|---|---|
| Week 1 | 10 → 30 → 60 → 100/day | Algorithmic ramp · only verified Apollo contacts · only highest-confidence pitches |
| Week 2 | 100 → 200/day | Likely-deliverable contacts unlocked |
| Week 3 | 200 → 400/day | Sequence touch-2 + touch-3 enabled |
| Week 4+ | Per-plan cap | Full cap (Starter 30/mo · Growth 500/mo · Scale 2,000/mo) |
If you already have a warm domain (sending 100+ legitimate emails/day for the past 6 months from the same sender address), you can request a fast-track warm-up that compresses week 1 into 24 hours. Email hello@pitch2retail.com with proof of historical send volume.
Volume and pacing limits
Inbox providers don't just measure volume per day — they measure burst patterns. Sending 100 messages in 10 minutes looks like a spam blast. Sending 100 messages spread over 8 hours looks like a human. We pace automatically:
- Send window: 8am–5pm in your recipient's local timezone (auto-detected from contact metadata)
- Inter-message delay: 30-180 seconds randomized between sends
- Per-recipient frequency cap: max 1 pitch per contact per 14-day window across your entire account
- Day-of-week pacing: Tue/Wed/Thu favored · weekends auto-deferred unless you override
Content quality (the real spam filter)
Authentication gets you past the gate. Content keeps you in the inbox. Modern Bayesian filters score every message on hundreds of features. We block or warn on the worst offenders before send:
| Risk | What we flag |
|---|---|
| Spammy phrases | "Act now", "limited time", "100% free", "guaranteed", "click here", "buy direct" — full list in our CASL page |
| ALL CAPS subjects | Subject lines > 50% caps are auto-flagged |
| Excessive punctuation | !!! ??? $$$ trigger spam scores |
| Image-heavy bodies | Recommend < 30% image content; we auto-add alt text |
| Link shorteners | bit.ly / t.co / tinyurl blocked — use your real URL with our UTM injection |
| Tracking pixel density | One pixel max · we offer a "no-tracking" option for privacy-sensitive sends |
| Reply-detection bait | "Are you the right person?" repeated across 5+ pitches in a batch flagged |
Bounce + complaint handling
What happens when a send fails:
- Hard bounce (invalid mailbox): contact moved to suppression within 60 seconds. Never retried.
- Soft bounce (mailbox full / temporary): retried once after 4 hours. Two soft bounces = soft suppression for 30 days.
- Spam complaint: contact suppressed permanently. Tenant-level alert if rate exceeds 0.1%.
- Unsubscribe: instant suppression — fewer than 5 seconds from click to "do not contact" flag.
If your tenant complaint rate exceeds 0.3% of sends in any 7-day window, sending pauses automatically and we email you for a list-quality review. This is to protect your domain reputation, not punish you — typical re-enable is 24-48 hours after we review.
Use a sending subdomain (recommended)
Don't send pitches from your root domain (brand.com). Use a subdomain like outreach.brand.com or buyers.brand.com. Reasons:
- Reputation isolation: if a pitch series triggers a spam flag, only the subdomain's reputation suffers — your transactional and customer mail from the root keeps flowing
- DMARC stays strict on root: you can run
p=rejectonbrand.comwhile your subdomain warms up - Cleaner From header: "Pat from Brand <pat@outreach.brand.com>" is easier to whitelist than mixing transactional + outreach on one domain
We auto-suggest outreach.<your-domain> at sender setup and walk you through the DNS records.
What you should do
- Use a real human From name + address. "Pat at Your Brand <pat@yourbrand.com>" beats "Your Brand Sales <noreply@yourbrand.com>" by ~40% on reply rate.
- Keep subject lines under 50 chars and lowercase. "stop replacing 20+ steak knives monthly" ranks higher than "STOP REPLACING YOUR KNIVES NOW!!!"
- Reply from the same address you send from. Buyers will reply. If your replies bounce, future sends get filtered harder.
- Watch your reply rate. If reply rate < 1% over 200+ sends, the audience or pitch is wrong. Pause and revise — don't push more volume.
- Don't paste pitches you wrote elsewhere. Use our composer so the compliance lint can run against the content.
What kills deliverability fast
- Sending to a stale list (anything > 6 months old without re-verification)
- Buying or merging in CSVs from other sources without verification
- Sending from a brand-new domain with no warm-up
- Identical pitch body sent 100+ times with only the recipient name swapped
- Subject lines testing "RE:" or "FW:" tricks (instant deception flag)
- Hidden white-on-white text or pixel-stuffing for length
- Misleading "unsubscribe" links that go to a sales page
- Ignoring soft-bounces and re-sending immediately
Pitch2Retail's compliance lint catches most of these before send. But the human factor — list hygiene, frequency restraint, honest framing — is on you.
Inbox placement, engineered.
SPF, DKIM, DMARC + warm-up + suppression — handled at onboarding. Start free.
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