Summary
When using dedicated IP addresses, the responsibility for email deliverability predominantly shifts to the sender, moving away from the shared reputation model. However, Email Service Providers (ESPs) still play a critical, albeit supportive, role by furnishing the essential infrastructure and a suite of tools. This includes network configuration, IP allocation, automated warm-up plans, bounce and complaint processing, and the setup of crucial authentication protocols like SPF, DKIM, and DMARC. Beyond technical provisions, ESPs also offer invaluable consultation, deliverability monitoring, and policy enforcement, often acting as a necessary 'bad guy' to prevent clients from engaging in practices that could harm their IP's reputation. While it's theoretically possible for an organization to manage all deliverability aspects independently, ESPs provide the scale, expertise, and efficiency that make their services economically and practically viable for most senders.
Key findings
- Sender Centrality: On a dedicated IP, the sender's practices-list quality, content relevance, sending volume, engagement, and complaint rates-are the overriding factors determining deliverability, as the IP's reputation is solely their responsibility.
- ESPs as Technical Facilitators: ESPs provide the fundamental infrastructure and critical technical tools, such as feedback loop management, bounce processing, warm-up guidance, and authentication setup, which are vital for effective dedicated IP management.
- Advisory and Enforcement Role: ESPs offer significant value through their deliverability expertise, providing consultation, trend analysis across their client base, and acting as a necessary enforcer of best practices to safeguard client and network reputations.
- Efficiency and Scalability: Leveraging an ESP provides operational efficiencies and economies of scale for tasks like data analysis, bounce management rules, and staying current with evolving deliverability standards, which would be resource-intensive for individual senders.
Key considerations
- Evaluate ESP Deliverability Departments: Instead of focusing on vague claims of 'good deliverability,' assess an ESP based on the strength of its dedicated deliverability team, their proactive support, and their ability to provide strategic guidance.
- Personal Responsibility for Reputation: Understand that even with an ESP, the onus of maintaining a healthy IP reputation rests squarely on the sender's consistent adherence to email best practices.
- Value of Compliance and Boundaries: Appreciate the ESP's role in setting and enforcing boundaries; this 'bad guy' function is crucial for preventing actions that could severely damage your dedicated IP's deliverability.
- Cost-Benefit of Self-Management: While independent deliverability management is technically feasible, carefully weigh the significant staff, training, and infrastructure costs against the comprehensive services and efficiency offered by an ESP.
What email marketers say
17 marketer opinions
On dedicated IPs, Email Service Providers (ESPs) significantly influence deliverability by providing the essential technical foundation, advanced management tools, and crucial advisory support, even as the ultimate responsibility for IP reputation rests with the sender. ESPs are instrumental in setting up and maintaining the core sending infrastructure, including configuring outbound MTAs, assisting with whitelabeling, and ensuring proper cooling periods for recycled IPs. Their platforms offer vital features like automated IP warm-up processes, real-time reputation monitoring, and comprehensive processing of bounces, complaints, and unsubscribe requests. ESPs also manage critical technical standards, such as enrolling in feedback loops and ensuring correct List-Unsubscribe headers, directly impacting inbox placement. Beyond these technical contributions, they provide valuable deliverability consultation, root cause analysis, and insights into industry trends. A key, often overlooked, impact is their role in actively policing dedicated IPs and enforcing sending best practices, which prevents clients from engaging in activities that could degrade their IP's reputation. This comprehensive support from ESPs, offering specialized tooling, expertise, and enforcement, makes them indispensable for maximizing deliverability on dedicated IPs, making independent management a less viable option for most organizations.
Key opinions
- Sender's Practice is Paramount: On a dedicated IP, the sender's diligence in maintaining list quality, ensuring content relevance, managing engagement, and adhering to consistent sending volumes directly dictates the IP's reputation and deliverability outcomes.
- ESPs Provide Foundational Infrastructure: Email Service Providers supply the critical technical setup, including IP addresses, network configuration, MTAs, and essential tools for whitelabeling and throttling, forming the base for all email sending activities.
- Advanced Deliverability Tooling: ESPs offer sophisticated features designed to manage and protect dedicated IP reputation, such as automated warm-up protocols, real-time monitoring (e.g., 250ok integration), feedback loop enrollment, and efficient processing of unsubscribes, bounces, and complaints.
- Crucial Advisory and Policing Function: Beyond tools, ESPs impact deliverability by offering expert consultation, performing root cause analysis, providing insights from broad customer trends, and critically, enforcing sending policies to prevent damaging practices and maintain IP health.
Key considerations
- Sender's Practices Dictate Outcome: With a dedicated IP, consistent, positive sending behaviors-such as proper warm-up, clean list management, and relevant content-are paramount, as the sender directly builds or harms their IP's reputation.
- Maximize ESP's Technical and Monitoring Support: Senders should actively utilize their ESP's offerings, including performance analytics, reputation monitoring, and automated processes for FBLs and unsubs, which are essential for effective IP management.
- Appreciate ESP's Role in Policing and Guidance: The ESP's function in setting boundaries and providing deliverability consultation, including proactive reports and root cause analysis, is vital for preventing reputation-damaging activities and ensuring sustained inbox placement.
- Consider the Comprehensive Value of an ESP: While seemingly simple to manage independently, an ESP provides a tuned infrastructure, efficiency of scale in data processing, and access to specialized expertise that offers significant long-term value and economic viability compared to self-managed solutions.
Marketer view
Marketer from Email Geeks explains that ESPs can provide 250ok monitoring and assist with delisting client IPs and root cause analysis. Their send engines can block misspelled domains. Some platforms offer autowarming. ESPs can also configure throttling at the VMTA to spread out deployments and assist with whitelabeling setup.
14 Nov 2024 - Email Geeks
Marketer view
Marketer from Email Geeks shares that an ESP's role includes enrolling in feedback loops and processing unsubscribe requests and complaints.
19 Jul 2021 - Email Geeks
What the experts say
4 expert opinions
For organizations using a dedicated IP address, the primary accountability for email deliverability squarely rests with the sender. Email Service Providers (ESPs) play a crucial supportive role by supplying the fundamental infrastructure and essential tools, but their function shifts from direct reputation management, as seen with shared IPs, to facilitating mail delivery. ESPs ensure proper network configuration, provide systems for bounce management, list hygiene, and authentication, and offer tools to streamline deployments and mitigate blocks. Furthermore, they contribute by monitoring general network health, updating technology, advising on policy and strategy, and critically, by enforcing best practices to prevent clients from engaging in actions detrimental to their dedicated IP's reputation. Ultimately, the sender's consistent mailing habits and adherence to established best practices are the sole determinants of their dedicated IP's standing and inbox placement.
Key opinions
- Sender's Ultimate Control: With a dedicated IP, the sender gains full control over its reputation, making their sending practices the sole determinant of deliverability, unlike on shared IPs.
- ESPs as Enablers, Not Managers: ESPs primarily provide the necessary infrastructure and tools, like network configuration and mail facilitation, but they do not actively manage the specific dedicated IP's reputation on behalf of the sender.
- Comprehensive ESP Support: ESPs offer a range of critical services that support deliverability, including bounce management, list hygiene, authentication, rate limiting, and general network monitoring.
- Advisory and Policing Function: ESPs contribute through policy guidance, keeping up with new technology, and importantly, by "policing" clients and preventing harmful practices that could degrade IP reputation.
- Scrutinize ESP Claims: Senders should approach ESPs claiming "good deliverability" with skepticism, instead seeking out those with robust Deliverability departments that proactively mitigate issues and offer expert advice.
Key considerations
- Acknowledge Sole Responsibility: Understand that using a dedicated IP places the entire burden of reputation and deliverability directly on the sender's mailing practices.
- Prioritize Proactive ESP Support: When selecting an ESP, value their strong Deliverability department and their ability to provide proactive support and strategic best practice guidance, rather than vague assurances.
- Embrace ESP's Enforcement Role: Recognize that an ESP's role as a "bad guy" or enforcer of policies is beneficial, as it protects your dedicated IP's reputation by preventing detrimental sending behaviors.
- Leverage ESP's Technical Tools: Actively utilize the ESP's tools for managing bounces, implementing authentication, and monitoring network health, as these are critical for maintaining a healthy dedicated IP reputation.
Expert view
Expert from Email Geeks states that ESP roles include bounce management, list hygiene, trap/typo suppression, tools to ease deployments, block mitigation, general network deliverability monitoring, policing bad clients, authentication management and monitoring, policy and strategy guidance, keeping up with new technology, rate limiting, and acting as a 'bad guy' to prevent clients from implementing harmful practices.
4 Aug 2024 - Email Geeks
Expert view
Expert from Email Geeks advises skepticism towards ESPs claiming 'good deliverability,' suggesting they should instead highlight a strong Deliverability department that proactively mitigates issues and advises on best practices, acknowledging that deliverability is largely the sender's responsibility.
11 Jul 2023 - Email Geeks
What the documentation says
6 technical articles
When an organization utilizes a dedicated IP address, Email Service Providers (ESPs) significantly shape deliverability by providing the essential technical foundation and an array of specialized tools, even though the ultimate responsibility for IP reputation resides with the sender. ESPs manage the core infrastructure, including IP allocation and network configuration, and offer crucial mechanisms for successful sending, such as structured warm-up plans, robust bounce and feedback loop processing, and critical analytics. While ESPs empower senders with these capabilities and data, it is the sender's consistent adherence to email best practices-like maintaining high list hygiene, sending engaging content, and managing sending volumes responsibly-that directly builds and sustains the dedicated IP's hard-earned reputation with Internet Service Providers (ISPs).
Key findings
- Sender's Primary Role: On a dedicated IP, the sender's practices-including content quality, list hygiene, sending volume, engagement levels, and low complaint rates-are the sole determinants of the IP's reputation and deliverability performance.
- ESPs as Infrastructure Providers: Email Service Providers furnish the fundamental technical infrastructure, managing IP allocation, network settings, and underlying systems necessary for sending email via a dedicated IP.
- Tooling and Guidance Provided: ESPs offer a comprehensive suite of tools and expert guidance, such as automated IP warm-up protocols, bounce processing, feedback loop management, and assistance with critical authentication setups like SPF, DKIM, and DMARC.
- Monitoring and Data Support: While not directly managing the reputation, ESPs provide crucial monitoring capabilities, metrics, and notifications to help senders track their dedicated IP's health and performance.
Key considerations
- Full Sender Accountability: Senders must recognize and embrace full accountability for their dedicated IP's reputation, as its success or failure is a direct reflection of their sending behavior and practices.
- Strategic Use of ESP Tools: Actively leverage the dedicated IP tools and analytics provided by the ESP, such as warm-up plans, bounce management, and performance monitoring, to effectively build and maintain a strong sending reputation.
- Adherence to Best Practices: Consistently applying email sending best practices-including proper list segmentation, content relevance, managing engagement, and avoiding spam traps-is paramount for sustained deliverability on a dedicated IP.
- Ongoing Monitoring is Key: Regularly review the performance metrics and alerts provided by the ESP to quickly identify and address any issues that could negatively impact your dedicated IP's reputation.
Technical article
Documentation from SendGrid explains that a dedicated IP's reputation is solely tied to the sender's practices, not shared with others. While SendGrid provides the infrastructure and tools like warm-up plans, bounce processing, and FBLs, the sender's content, list hygiene, and sending volume consistency directly determine deliverability on that IP. SendGrid helps with initial setup and provides data, but the sender owns the reputation built upon their sending behavior.
20 Jul 2022 - SendGrid
Technical article
Documentation from Mailgun emphasizes that while they provide the dedicated IP, the sender is entirely responsible for building and maintaining its reputation. Mailgun offers tools for warm-up, monitoring, and compliance, but the sender's consistent sending behavior, volume, engagement, and low spam complaints directly dictate the IP's deliverability performance.
15 Apr 2025 - Mailgun
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