Understanding and managing email bounce on systeme.io

In this article, you will learn what bounced emails are,  why they occur, and how to prevent them.

What is an email bounce?

An email that bounces is an email that is not delivered to an email address.

When this occurs, the sender can have an overview of contacts that did not receive the email at the email statistics level or the contact record level of each contact in the sent email history.

Hard bounce vs Soft bounce

On systeme.io, there are two categories of bounces you may encounter: 

1. Soft bounces 
2. Hard bounces. 

Soft bounces should be considered as temporary blocks; there is no need to permanently remove email addresses that have not received an email from your contact list. 

On the other hand, hard bounces correspond to invalid or non-existent addresses that must be immediately removed from your contact list.

Soft bounce:

A "soft bounce" means that:

• The recipient's email address was valid 
• The message reached the recipient's mail server, but
• The message was rejected for delivery to the recipient's email inbox 

Since the rejection was only for a specific email, when a soft bounce occurs, systeme.io does not mark the contact as “bounced” on the user’s contact list.

The most common reasons for a soft bounce are:

• Recipient server unavailable
• SMTP unavailability
• Rejection due to a blocked IP address
• Rejection due to blacklisted domain
• Due to suspicious or spam-like content

Hard bounce:

A "hard bounce" means that the sent email was permanently rejected for one of the following reasons:

• Email address is not valid
• Email address does not exist
• Recipient's email inbox is full

Systeme.io handles hard bounces in two different ways:

1. For email addresses marked as "bounced" on the contact list: 

To prevent harming your deliverability, since we know it’s invalid, a bounced contact will not be selected when sending an email.

Note that as a member of systeme.io support, we can reactivate a contact in "bounced" status, but will only do so if you are certain of the email address's validity.

2. For false email addresses: 

These email addresses are automatically removed from the user's contact list once recognized as false or deactivated.

How to improve your email bounce rate?

Improving the email bounce rate is essential for ensuring your messages effectively reach your target audience and generate positive interactions. Here are some tips to improve your email bounce rate:

1. Regularly clean your email lists: Remove invalid, inactive, or disengaged email addresses from your lists to maintain their quality and reduce bounces.
2. Use double opt-in forms: Ask subscribers to confirm their sign-up via an email link. This ensures that only authentic and interested people join your list, reducing the risk of bounces.
3. Personalize your emails: Use the data you have on your subscribers to personalize your emails based on their interests, past behavior, or purchase history. Personalized emails tend to have higher open and click rates, which can reduce bounces.
4. Segment your email list: Divide your list into segments based on criteria such as geographic location, purchase preferences, or online behavior. By sending more targeted and relevant emails to each segment, you can reduce the chances of bounces.
5. Use email address verification tools: Before sending emails to your list, use email address verification tools to identify and remove invalid or nonexistent addresses.
6. Avoid spam-like words and practices: Avoid using terms and techniques that could trigger spam filters, such as uppercase words, exaggerated phrases, or too frequent sending.
7. Encourage engagement and responses: Include clear and relevant calls to action in your emails to encourage subscribers to respond, click on links, or interact with your content. Active engagement can help reduce bounces by strengthening the relationship with your audience.

By applying these tips and keeping a close eye on your email performance indicators, you should be able to significantly reduce your bounce rate and optimize the overall yield of your emails.