It's September... and back to school! I'm back to analyzing emails 🙂 Today, I've chosen an email from Breathe received in my tab Notifications from Gmail. You're familiar with Breathe ?
Who is Respire?
SKIN IS POWER
In 2018, Justine Hutteau co-founded the Respire brand with Thomas Meheut, a company dedicated to natural vegan cosmetics. If you'd like to find out more, Les Echos Entrepreneurs has a complete article on the brand, which I invite you to read.
Why choose a Respire email?
For some time now, I've been changing a lot of things in my life. Whether it's in my diet, my personal care products or my consumer goods, in short, everything is changing. And I came across Respire by chance (through several media, including a TV channel a while back :p).
One of the strong points of this brand is their products. These are all 100% vegan and none of them are derived from animal exploitation and none of them are tested on them (this I totally approve of). By the way, Respire has dedicated a complete page on the subject of veganism if you're interested!
Please note, however, that I haven't tested their products (yet), and I'm not here to beta-test or sell a particular product :p
Technical configuration analysis!
MailFrom domain :news.respire.co
From domain :breathe.co
Reply-to domain :breathe.co
Tracking domain :ctrk.klclick.com
Hosting domain :d3k81ch9hvuctc.cloudfront.net
Shared IP :167.89.72.26
- [+][~] Sending domain Respire uses their main domain name to communicate their promotional emails. If they're sure of the quality of their emails, why not... Otherwise, it would have been better to use a sub-domain for their mass mailings and keep the main domain name for collaborators and transactional mailings.
- [–] Reply address No address is declared, which means that the sender's address will be used as the reply address! I hope it's consulted and recorded by Customer Services, otherwise they might miss out on some interesting feedback from their customers;
- [–] Tracking domain No settings have been made for the tracking domain, which means that Respire uses Klaviyo's shared domain (klclick.com), increasing the risk of false positives for domain non-alignment.
- [–] Shared IP It belongs to Klaviyo and is shared with at least 3,500 other sending domains (over the last 30 days), which is a lot! Don't forget that in the event of an impact on this IP (a listing on a block list, for example), all advertisers using the IP will be affected.
Optimization to be planned : I can think of 2 ways to improve Respire's performance. Personalizing tracking and switching to a dedicated IP if the volume of emails sent is substantial (they already have a good frequency: 1 email every 3/4 days).
- Klaviyo offers the possibility of customizing a domain name dedicated to tracking, so why deprive yourself? It's all explained here: https://help.klaviyo.com/hc/en-us/articles/360001550572.
- Klaviyo also offers the possibility - under certain conditions - of having a dedicated IP. It remains to be seen whether Respire is eligible, and whether switching to a dedicated IP would be beneficial for them (better control of their sender reputation).
Authentication analysis!
SPF registration : v=spf1 include:sendgrid.net ~all
[+An SPF record is present and valid on the mailfrom domain. news.respire.co with a SoftFail qualifier. Only Sendgrid IPs (used by Klaviyo) are authorized for use with this subdomain.
DKIM registration : k=rsa; t=s; p=MIIBIjANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAAOCAQ8AMIIBC...
[+A DKIM record is present and valid on the sending domain. breathe.co with a key length of 2048 bits.
Optimization to be planned Even if the DKIM key is valid, we could add the DKIM version used at the beginning of the public key, i.e. v=DKIM1;
DMARC registration : v=DMARC1;p=none;rua=mailto:olivier@respire.co
[~A DMARC record is present and valid on the sending domain. breathe.co but no security policy is defined. It does, however, comply with the requirements demanded by Google / Yahoo. An internal email address has been added to RUA reports. Are they really consulted and analyzed?
Optimization to be planned A DMARC policy upgrade would be welcome to improve domain name security, but also for BIMI implementation. The use of an external tool for reading and monitoring RUA reports wouldn't go amiss either 😉
BIMI registration : BIMI Record Not found
[–No BIMI registration found, which is a pity. With a DMARC record of none, Respire isn't eligible for BIMI anyway. On the other hand, since the Mx servers of the sending domain point to Google, Respire could have added the logo in the profile picture of the sending address of the Google Workspace account (imitating Babbel) to give their Gmail users the benefit of the logo in their Inbox (without the blue checkmark though).
Optimization to be planned : Why not go one step further and buy VMC brand certificate to have this famous blue check and/or the logo in certain messaging systems, including Gmail. In short, to see if there is any interest for them today to implement BIMI => That's debatable 🙂
Content analysis / design!
Mirror link : To be improved
[–] No mirror link is present, either in the header or in the footer! Breathe should take a look at Thomas' post about mirror links and their benefits: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/thomas-defossez-2b187256_emails-emailsgeeks-emailmarketing-activity-7234833500288286720-Zmn6?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
CTA : Perfect
[+Two CTAs are present in the email. The first is located on the image (the CTA and the image are one and the same) and the other (which is a button) is at the end of the second block.
Email size : Perfect
[+] The email is not truncated in my Inbox, which means it's less than 102Kb and therefore displays completely, allowing the footer (including the unsubscribe link and tracking pixel) to be clearly visible.
Dark Mode: Perfect
[+] Reading the email in dark mode (i.e. on my mobile) was just as easy as on my Mac. Text and colors stand out well on both.
Unsubscribe : Perfect
[+A 2-step unsubscribe link is visible in the footer (a branded page opens with the unsubscribe confirmation). The functionality List-Unsubscribe=One-Click is present in the header and Gmail displays the text Unsubscribe to the right of the sender address, which shows that Respire has a good reputation with Gmail (Good Job!).
Reputation analysis!
IP blocklists & domains : Listing on minor blocklists
[~...] Even if the sender's IP and domain are not listed on a major Blocklist (like SpamHaus), some minor (i.e. low-impact) Blocklists do come up for the sender's IP and domain (at least the IP associated with the sender's domain). But nothing serious in my opinion.
IP Anti-Spam Filters : No listing
[+... Barracuda Central, Cisco Talos, Postmaster Free, Proofpoint, Symantec & Trend Micro do not show any IP listing 167.89.72.26 the moment I checked it.
Senderscore IP : 82/100
[–] THE IP 167.89.72.26 had an average score of 82/100 with one indicator impacted at Medium, namely Sender Rejected (rate of emails blocked by email providers). It should also be noted that 10 spamtraps were affected, indicating that some advertisers using IP do not have good database hygiene...
Conclusion
This email is rather well targeted - received on September 1st - for the period. During the month of September (at least for the first 15 days), the weather is generally very sunny... Which is why it's a good idea to have a good sun cream on hand! Even if it depends on where you live (cf. Brittany for me :p). Even if a few things could be improved, in the end, email doesn't fare too badly 🙂
And how do you see this email from Breathe ? Do you also receive their emails in your Inbox / Spam?
Please visit our page dedicated to our email selections and analyses 🙂
Enjoy your reading!