Should I use a common email address if individual seller emails are blacklisted?
Michael Ko
Co-founder & CEO, Suped
Published 13 May 2025
Updated 16 Aug 2025
9 min read
When individual seller emails within your organization start getting flagged as spam or wind up on a blacklist, it’s natural to look for a quick fix. One common suggestion is to consolidate all sending under a single, shared email address on a different domain. The idea is that this common address would absorb any potential issues, leaving your primary domain clean. However, while this approach might seem appealing on the surface, it often introduces new and more complex deliverability challenges rather than solving them.
The core problem isn't just which specific email address is sending the mail, but rather the underlying sending behavior that led to the blacklisting in the first place. Email filters and internet service providers (ISPs) evaluate a sender’s reputation based on numerous signals, not just the From address. These signals include engagement rates, spam complaint rates, bounces, and whether the sending IP address or domain appears on various blocklists (or blacklists).
When an individual seller’s email gets blacklisted, it indicates a problem with the content, audience, or frequency of their outreach. Email blacklists are databases of IP addresses and domains known to send spam. They are crucial tools for ISPs and email services to protect users from unwanted mail. Getting listed means your emails are likely to be rejected or sent straight to the spam folder, impacting your ability to communicate effectively. To understand more, you can read our simple guide to how email blacklists work.
The immediate consequence of an email address being blocklisted is a severe drop in deliverability. For a business, this means lost opportunities, damaged credibility, and a breakdown in customer communication. What’s often overlooked is that these individual issues can quickly escalate to affect the entire domain or even the sending IP address, pulling down the reputation of other legitimate email streams. Learn more about what happens when your domain is on a blacklist.
Rather than focusing on isolating a single blacklisted email address, it is more effective to identify and address the root causes of the flagging. This involves understanding the type of mail being sent, the recipient engagement, and the specific reasons for the blocklisting. Many email filtering systems look beyond just the From address, considering factors like the sending IP, the domain in the Return-Path, and the various authentication domains (SPF, DKIM, DMARC). You can learn more about what an email blacklist is and how to avoid them.
Centralizing sending: a false solution?
The suggestion to move all sellers to a common email address, perhaps on a different domain like sales@company.net, is often proposed to protect the main corporate domain. While this may seem like a plausible workaround, it’s rarely a sustainable or scalable solution. If the problematic sending behaviors persist, this new common address will quickly face the same issues, becoming blacklisted itself. In fact, consolidating all potentially problematic mail onto a single address can make it even easier for ISPs to identify and block your entire mailstream.
The underlying problem isn't the specific From address but rather the content and sending practices. If your sellers are sending unwanted emails, regardless of the sender address, email providers like Google (if using G-Suite, for example) will continue to flag or block them. This can eventually damage the reputation of your primary domain, affecting all your legitimate email traffic. Check out our detailed article on whether multiple email addresses from the same domain create deliverability issues.
Ultimately, shifting to a common email address to avoid blocklists is a temporary patch, not a permanent solution. It diverts the problem rather than resolving it. The goal should be to reform the sending practices that lead to blacklisting, ensuring all email, regardless of the sender address, is wanted and compliant.
The shared common address problem
Aggregated risk: Instead of individual sellers facing issues, the entire team's email deliverability becomes vulnerable if the common address gets blocklisted.
Domain contamination risk: A new domain for the common address may eventually suffer the same fate, and if not carefully managed, could still negatively impact your main domain's reputation.
Lack of clear sender identity: Recipients might find it confusing to receive emails from a generic address rather than a specific contact, potentially reducing engagement.
Strategic sender separation and reputation management
The most effective long-term solution involves segmenting your email traffic and managing sender reputation strategically. This means setting up separate mailing infrastructures for different types of email, especially for those that carry a higher risk of complaints or flagging, such as cold outreach or sales prospecting. Your transactional emails (e.g., order confirmations, password resets) should be on a separate, highly reputable domain or subdomain, distinct from marketing or sales communications. You can find out more on best practices for using multiple email sender addresses.
For sales outreach or bulk sending, using dedicated subdomains or entirely separate domains can act as a firewall. This way, if one domain or subdomain encounters blocklisting issues due to aggressive outreach, your primary corporate domain and critical email streams remain protected. This isolation prevents a bad reputation from one type of sending activity from spilling over and affecting your entire email program. Consider reviewing our guide on using subdomains for prospecting outreach.
Proper email authentication, including SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, is also non-negotiable for protecting your domain's reputation. These protocols verify that emails are legitimate and prevent spoofing, which is a common tactic used by spammers. Ensuring these are correctly configured for all your sending domains and subdomains is fundamental to long-term deliverability. Our simple guide to DMARC, SPF, and DKIM can help you set these up correctly. Building a robust infrastructure means understanding the difference between different mail streams and tailoring your approach to each.
Common address (quick fix)
Consolidates all outreach, including problematic mail, onto a single email address. This doesn't change underlying sending practices, only the visible sender.
Reputation impact
The common address and its associated domain are at high risk of rapid blacklisting. This can still indirectly harm the main domain if not fully isolated.
Scalability
Poor. As the volume of problematic mail grows, the common address will inevitably be blocked, requiring continuous shifts to new common addresses, which is unsustainable.
Maintaining sender reputation
Beyond setting up the right infrastructure, ongoing sender reputation management is critical. This involves strict adherence to email marketing best practices, such as only sending to genuinely opted-in contacts, regularly cleaning your email lists, and avoiding spam traps. Getting off a blocklist requires addressing the root cause and requesting de-listing, which can be a time-consuming process.
Regularly monitor your domain and IP addresses for appearances on blacklists or blocklists. Tools that provide blocklist monitoring can alert you quickly if your sending reputation is compromised, allowing you to take immediate corrective action. Understanding your email domain reputation is key to proactive management.
Ultimately, shifting to a common email address to avoid blocklists is a temporary patch, not a permanent solution. It diverts the problem rather than resolving it. The goal should be to reform the sending practices that lead to blacklisting, ensuring all email, regardless of the sender address, is wanted and compliant.
Practice
Impact on Deliverability
Sending to unengaged recipients
Leads to spam complaints and low engagement, severely damaging sender reputation and increasing blacklist risk.
Using single opt-in for all lists
Can result in lower quality lists, more spam complaints, and higher bounce rates due to invalid addresses or uninterested recipients.
Ignoring DMARC reports
Missing critical insights into authentication failures and potential abuse of your domain, hindering proactive reputation management.
Sending only to verified opt-in contacts
Enhances engagement, reduces spam complaints, and builds a strong positive sender reputation.
Implementing DMARC with a strong policy
Protects your domain from spoofing and phishing, signals authenticity to ISPs, and improves email deliverability.
Regularly monitoring sender reputation
Allows for early detection of issues, quick response to blocklistings, and consistent optimization of sending practices.
Isolating high-risk mailstreams
If you're dealing with a mix of email types, such as opt-in follow-ups and outbound sales emails, it is crucial to separate these mail streams. Moving legitimate, opt-in sequences to a dedicated marketing automation platform designed for compliant sending can protect their deliverability. The remaining outbound emails, especially those prone to high complaint rates, should then be sent from entirely separate domains or subdomains, ideally with their own dedicated IP addresses if volume permits.
This deliberate separation acts as a firewall, containing any potential damage from risky sending activities. While it doesn't solve the underlying issue of sending potentially unwanted mail, it mitigates the impact on your most critical email communications, ensuring that your core business emails continue to reach the inbox. It also provides a clear path to managing and improving the reputation of each mail stream independently.
Views from the trenches
Best practices
Always separate high-risk email campaigns, like cold outreach, from your core transactional and marketing emails.
Use dedicated domains or subdomains for different email types to compartmentalize sender reputation.
Implement strong email authentication (SPF, DKIM, DMARC) for all sending domains.
Monitor your domain and IP addresses regularly for any appearances on email blacklists.
Common pitfalls
Consolidating all email sending, especially problematic outreach, to a single common address.
Ignoring the root causes of blacklisting and focusing only on changing the sender address.
Using a shared IP address for high-volume or risky email campaigns, affecting others.
Failing to segment email lists and send relevant content, leading to high complaint rates.
Expert tips
Consider a separate G-Suite account or email service provider for cold outreach to completely isolate reputation.
Focus on improving the quality of your recipient lists to reduce spam complaints and improve engagement.
Understand that fixing deliverability is a continuous process, not a one-time solution.
Regularly audit your email sending practices to ensure compliance and optimal performance.
Expert view
Expert from Email Geeks says the From address is one of the key elements mail filters use to identify a mailstream.
2021-11-23 - Email Geeks
Expert view
Expert from Email Geeks says filtering rarely relies on a single signal, and any temporary fix for blocklisting due to recipient reaction will not last.
2021-11-23 - Email Geeks
Protecting your domain's email health
Moving to a common email address when individual seller emails are blacklisted is generally not a recommended long-term strategy. While it might offer a temporary illusion of protection, it fails to address the fundamental issues causing the blacklisting. The problem lies not with the specific sender address, but with the quality of the email content and the underlying sending practices.
Instead, the focus should be on strategic segmentation of your email streams, utilizing separate domains or subdomains for different types of mail, and rigorously maintaining a high sender reputation across all channels. This proactive approach, combined with robust email authentication and continuous monitoring, is the only way to ensure sustainable email deliverability and protect your primary domain from harm. This comprehensive strategy is essential for improving your email deliverability rates in the long run.
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Google (if using G-Suite, for example) will continue to flag or block them. This can eventually damage the reputation of your primary domain, affecting all your legitimate email traffic. Check out our detailed article on whether multiple email addresses from the same domain create deliverability issues.
Regularly monitoring sender reputation
