How can email abuse be stopped, and deliverability recovered after reputation damage from cold outreach?
Michael Ko
Co-founder & CEO, Suped
Published 30 Jul 2025
Updated 22 Sep 2025
8 min read
Dealing with the aftermath of aggressive cold outreach can be a daunting task for any email marketer. Your domain and IP reputation, once robust, might now be struggling, leading to drastically reduced open rates and emails consistently landing in spam folders. This situation often arises when cold emailing practices are not aligned with email service provider guidelines or recipient expectations, creating a cycle of poor engagement and further reputation decay.
I've seen firsthand how a history of sending to unengaged lists, especially purchased ones, can plummet deliverability. The challenge is not just to fix the technical issues, but to fundamentally change sending habits to rebuild trust with internet service providers (ISPs) like Google and Outlook. It requires a strategic approach, moving away from high-volume, low-quality sends towards a more permission-based, engagement-focused strategy.
The goal is to not only stop email abuse but also to recover deliverability so that legitimate marketing and sales communications reach their intended inboxes. This process involves a detailed diagnosis of current issues, a clear strategy to cease problematic sending, and a robust plan for reputation rebuilding. It's about setting the foundation for sustainable and effective email communication in the long term.
Understanding the impact of cold outreach on reputation
When cold outreach campaigns impact reputation, we often observe inconsistencies in deliverability across different senders within the same domain. One salesperson might have notably lower open rates than another, even when emailing from the same data pool. This disparity can be attributed to several factors, including individual sending volumes, the specific lists being used by each salesperson, and how their sending behavior affects the shared infrastructure.
For instance, if a sales team uses HubSpot sequences, the assumption might be that each salesperson uses their own IP address. However, it's more common for such platforms to route emails through their own shared IP infrastructure, or through the integrated mail system (e.g., Gmail or Microsoft 365) associated with the sender's account. This means that a single salesperson's poor sending practices, like high volume to unverified lists, can negatively impact the domain reputation, affecting all other senders on that domain. The article on Cold Email Not Delivering? highlights common issues.
It's also worth noting that being listed on a minor blocklist, like SpamRats, while not ideal, is often a symptom rather than the primary cause of widespread deliverability issues, especially if the other IPs are clear. Major ISPs have their own internal filtering systems that weigh factors beyond just public blocklists (or blacklists). The core problem usually lies with overall sending reputation and recipient engagement.
To effectively diagnose these issues, I recommend a thorough review of Google Postmaster Tools for your domain and any associated IPs. This will provide insights into spam rates, IP and domain reputation, feedback loops, and authentication errors (like SPF failures). Understanding these metrics is the first step toward crafting a recovery plan.
Diagnosing authentication and reputation issues
One persistent issue I've encountered is the reported SPF authentication score never hitting full compliance, despite having SPF records for all email senders. This can happen for several reasons, even with seemingly correct records. Common culprits include DNS lookup limits, incorrect record syntax, or conflicts with other DNS records.
Why SPF might fail despite existing records
Exceeding lookup limit: SPF records can only have up to 10 DNS lookups. Adding too many includes can cause SPF to fail, resulting in a SPF PermError.
Incorrect syntax: Even a minor typo can invalidate your SPF record. Using online SPF validators can help identify these issues.
Multiple SPF records: A domain should only have one SPF TXT record. Multiple records will cause SPF to fail validation. These are often easy to fix common DMARC issues.
The proper implementation of DMARC is vital not just for security, but for insights into these authentication failures. DMARC works in conjunction with SPF and DKIM to verify email authenticity and provides reports (RUA and RUF) that detail how your emails are authenticating across the internet. These DMARC reports are your window into exactly why SPF might not be aligning or passing as expected.
I strongly recommend setting up DMARC monitoring with Suped. Our platform offers the most generous free plan available for DMARC reporting, providing actionable insights to resolve authentication issues, including SPF failures, and helping you improve overall deliverability quickly. It's a critical tool for understanding and controlling your email ecosystem.
Example SPF record (TXT record for your domain)DNS
The most crucial step to recovering from email abuse is to stop the problematic sending practices immediately. This means ceasing all cold emailing to unengaged or purchased lists. Continuing these practices will only prolong the reputation damage and make recovery more difficult, as noted in Cold Emails vs. Spam. The focus should shift entirely to sending to genuinely engaged recipients. This includes people who have explicitly opted-in, interacted with your brand at events, or downloaded content from your website.
Previous approach: cold outreach
List acquisition: Reliance on purchased or scraped email lists, often unverified.
Sending volume: High volume sends to a broad, untargeted audience.
Engagement: Minimal or no prior engagement from recipients, leading to high spam complaints.
This shift in strategy requires a meticulous cleaning of your email lists, removing invalid, inactive, or unengaged subscribers. Sending to a clean list ensures that your emails are more likely to reach interested recipients, improving engagement metrics and signaling positive behavior to ISPs. It's not about stopping outreach, it's about making it smarter.
Best practices for list cleaning and engagement
Remove unengaged subscribers: Segment out recipients who haven't opened or clicked emails in 90-180 days.
Validate email addresses: Use an email verification service to remove invalid or risky addresses.
Implement double opt-in: For new subscribers, require a second confirmation to ensure genuine interest and consent.
Advanced recovery and monitoring methods
After implementing a strategy to stop abusive cold outreach and clean your lists, the next phase is focused on advanced recovery and continuous monitoring. Reputation doesn't bounce back overnight. It takes consistent effort and positive sending behavior over time. Expect it to be a gradual process, but with diligence, you can recover email deliverability.
Continuous monitoring is non-negotiable. Leverage tools like Suped's DMARC monitoring to keep a close eye on your email authentication rates and delivery trends. This will provide you with the data needed to make informed decisions and detect any new issues proactively. Understanding how your emails are performing on a daily basis is key to sustainable deliverability.
Metric
Why it matters
How to track
Open Rate
Indicates recipient interest and inbox placement. A healthy sign of engagement.
Email service provider analytics.
Spam Complaint Rate
Direct feedback from recipients marking your email as unwanted. Keep it very low.
As your reputation stabilizes, consider gradually strengthening your DMARC policy to quarantine or reject. This provides stronger protection against impersonation and further enhances your sender trust. In severe cases of reputation damage, particularly if the primary domain is too tainted, it might be advisable to consider using a separate sending domain for your marketing communications while the main domain slowly recovers its standing.
Views from the trenches
Best practices
Actively monitor DMARC reports to identify authentication failures and unauthorized sending sources.
Segment your email lists and prioritize engagement from recipients who have interacted with your brand.
Implement a strict double opt-in process for all new subscribers to ensure genuine interest and consent.
Regularly clean your email lists by removing unengaged users, bounces, and inactive addresses.
Common pitfalls
Continuing to send cold emails to purchased lists without prior engagement will only worsen reputation.
Ignoring DMARC reports, leading to unresolved authentication issues and persistent deliverability problems.
Failing to adapt sending volume and frequency to match the current domain and IP reputation.
Underestimating the time required for reputation recovery; it is a gradual process.
Expert tips
Consider warming up a new IP address or even a new sending domain if your primary domain's reputation is severely damaged.
Analyze engagement metrics for each salesperson to identify differing practices that might impact overall deliverability.
Utilize Postmaster Tools to gain insights into your domain and IP reputation directly from major ISPs like Google.
Transition DMARC policies incrementally, moving from 'p=none' to 'p=quarantine' and eventually 'p=reject'.
Expert view
Expert from Email Geeks says: The first and most critical step is to completely stop all cold emailing. Allow a few weeks for legitimate email streams to recover before even considering any permission-based outreach.
2025-09-12 - Email Geeks
Expert view
Expert from Email Geeks says: SpamRats is largely irrelevant in the grand scheme of deliverability. Focus on the core issues impacting your sender reputation with major ISPs, not minor blocklists.
2025-09-12 - Email Geeks
Reclaiming your inbox presence
Recovering email deliverability and stopping abuse after reputation damage from cold outreach is a multi-faceted process that demands discipline and a commitment to best practices. It starts with an honest assessment of past sending behaviors and an immediate cessation of any practices that generate high spam complaints or low engagement. Prioritizing sending to truly engaged audiences is paramount for rebuilding trust with ISPs.
Implementing and monitoring robust email authentication protocols like SPF, DKIM, and DMARC is not just a technicality; it's a foundational step towards demonstrating legitimacy. Using a powerful DMARC reporting tool like Suped provides the necessary visibility into your email ecosystem to detect and rectify issues before they escalate. Consistent monitoring of key metrics will guide your recovery journey, allowing you to track progress and make timely adjustments.
Ultimately, reclaiming your inbox presence requires a long-term shift towards building meaningful relationships through email, rather than relying on volume-based, untargeted outreach. By focusing on engagement, maintaining clean lists, and leveraging advanced monitoring tools, you can not only recover from past damage but also establish a foundation for sustainable and highly effective email marketing and sales campaigns.
Google and 
Outlook. It requires a strategic approach, moving away from high-volume, low-quality sends towards a more permission-based, engagement-focused strategy.
HubSpot sequences, the assumption might be that each salesperson uses their own IP address. However, it's more common for such platforms to route emails through their own shared IP infrastructure, or through the integrated mail system (e.g., 
Gmail or 
Microsoft 365) associated with the sender's account. This means that a single salesperson's poor sending practices, like high volume to unverified lists, can negatively impact the domain reputation, affecting all other senders on that domain. The article on Cold Email Not Delivering? highlights common issues.
