Knowing what Letterhead handles for you

A lot of what keeps your email deliverable happens without you doing anything. This article gathers it in one place, so you know what’s already taken care of and where to look when you want to see it working. None of this can promise where a message lands in a reader’s inbox; mailbox providers make that call. It does keep the habits that hurt your reputation out of your sends.

Bounced and complaining addresses are cleaned

When an address hard-bounces (it doesn’t exist, or the receiving server refuses it permanently), or a reader marks your email as spam, Letterhead cleans that address so it gets no more of your newsletters. This protection is always on and can’t be turned off. Addresses that soft-bounce (a full inbox, a server that’s briefly down) keep receiving your newsletters, and only an address that keeps failing is cleaned. See Handling bounces.

Unsubscribes and suppressions are honored

Every newsletter carries an unsubscribe link, and a reader who unsubscribes, from that link or from their email app’s own unsubscribe button, stops receiving that newsletter. Anyone cleaned, unsubscribed or otherwise suppressed is left out of your sends automatically. A contact’s profile shows which newsletters they’re suppressed from and why.

Inactive readers can be cleaned for you

List cleanup finds readers who’ve stopped opening and clicking, and stops sending to them before they drag your reputation down. Depending on how your company sends, it can also clean inboxes that are always full and addresses that refuse your mail outright. See Using list cleanup.

Links and content are checked before you send

When you click Preview and schedule, the Content Check panel looks over your edition before it goes out: Links finds broken or empty links, and Bounce Risk flags content that mailbox providers tend to refuse. Separately, links to domains that appear on public blocklists are sent to a safety page instead, so one bad link can’t harm your readers or your reputation. See Keeping unsafe links out of your campaigns.

New addresses can be validated

Recipient Validation checks new addresses from imports, embed forms and archive signups, and cleans the ones that can’t receive mail. It’s a paid feature your Account Manager turns on. See Validating new addresses with Recipient Validation.

What’s still yours

Letterhead handles the mechanics, but a few things only you can do: send to people who asked for your newsletter, send on a steady schedule, and set up your own sending domain. See Improving your deliverability for recommendations, and Warming up your sending reputation if you’re moving from another platform.

If something here doesn’t seem to be happening, for example an address that hard-bounced is still being sent to, contact [email protected] and we’ll look into it.