Bounced, dropped, and deferred are email delivery statuses that indicate delivery issues:
Bounced — The receiving email server cannot or will not deliver the email. This usually happens because the email address is invalid or the email inbox is full. Bounced email addresses are dropped in future mailings.
Dropped — SendGrid did not try to send the email because the email address has already bounced.
Deferred — The email did not go through on the first attempt, probably because of Internet issues. SendGrid will try again.
Bounced and dropped emails are a problem because they are not delivered to your constituents. Worse, bounced and dropped emails affect your sending reputation and might result in more of your emails being automatically marked as spam.
Note: Google and Yahoo require bulk senders to follow email authentication and spam complaint rate requirements meant to increase email security and reduce spam.
Find Bounced or Dropped Email Addresses
To see which email addresses are problematic:
Click Communications.
Click Emails.
Click an email to open it.
Click Tracking.
In the Deliverability circle, click Bounced or Dropped. Affected recipients appear in a list.
(Optional) In the recipient list, click Export to Excel. An .XLSX file downloads to your computer.
Take Action
The recipient list includes a column for the reason the email was bounced or dropped. The reason determines what action you should take:
Invalid address or mailbox unavailable — Remove the email address from the constituent's profile. Contact the constituent to update his email address, or use another address on his profile.
Other bounce or drop reasons — Contact the constituent by some other means to verify her email address. Here's what to do based on the response:
Incorrect email address — Update the constituent's profile.
Correct email address — Check that your email administrator has added SendGrid to your domain and that those changes have propagated. If this has been done, contact Bloomerang Support and have them remove the email address from SendGrid's suppression list.
No response — Set the constituent's preferred communication channel to Mail, or change the primary email address for the constituent.
Best Practices
Bloomerang already includes subscription management links on all emails so constituents can update their own email addresses.
Once a year, send a contact information email. Use the merge fields for contact information to tell your constituents what contact information is currently in Bloomerang CRM. Ask them to reply with updated information.