How to set up domain authentication

What is domain authentication?

Domain authentication, formerly known as domain whitelabel, shows email providers that SendGrid has your permission to send emails on your behalf. To give SendGrid permission, you point DNS entries from your DNS provider (like GoDaddy, Rackspace, or Cloudflare) to SendGrid. Your recipients will no longer see the “via sendgrid.net” message on your emails.

Even though this is a small change from your recipient's perspective, this change has a huge positive impact on your reputation as a sender and your email deliverability. Email service providers distrust messages that don't have domain authentication set up because they can not be sure that the message comes from you. Explicitly stating that it comes from you increases your reputation with email service providers which makes it much less likely that they will filter your mail and not allow it get to your recipient's inbox, which increases your deliverability. You are also explicitly showing your recipients that this email comes from you, so they are less likely to mark your mail as spam.

Key terminology

DNS

DNS stands for Domain Name System. This is a naming system for domains on the internet. When SendGrid refers to your DNS, we are talking about your domain name that you want to send emails from, or that you want to link images from. When we talk about your DNS provider, we are talking about the service that hosts your domain name. For example, GoDaddy, Rackspace, or Cloudflare. For more information about DNS, see our DNS glossary page.

DKIM

DKIM stands for DomainKeys Identified Mail which was designed to help email providers prevent malicious email senders by validating email from specific domains.

As one of the most popular email authentication methodologies, it works by using cryptographic technology that adds a digital signature to your message header. This DKIM signature validates and authorizes your domain name in the eyes of the receiver. The DKIM signature is created using a unique string of characters stored as a public key.

When your email is received, the public key is retrieved through the DNS and decrypted by the receiver to allow them to confidently verify the identity of your domain. For more information about DKIM, see our DKIM glossary page.

SPF

Sender Policy Framework (SPF) is an email authentication standard developed by AOL that compares the email sender’s actual IP address to a list of IP addresses authorized to send mail from that domain. The IP list is published in the domain’s DNS record. For more information about SPF, check out our SPF glossary page.

CNAME

The CNAME record creates an alias for subdomain.yourdomain.com and points to sendgrid.net. The CNAME is needed for our click and open tracking features in order for those statistics to be routed back to your SendGrid account. This will also be what your messages are signed by, so your recipients will be able to see what you have chosen for your CNAME. You set up the CNAME files that SendGrid provides with your DNS host. For more information about CNAME, see our CNAME glossary page.

Setting up domain authentication

Before you begin

To set up domain authentication, you must submit the DNS records provided by SendGrid to your DNS or hosting provider (for example, GoDaddy, Hover, CloudFlare, etc.). First, figure out who your hosting provider is and if you have access. If you don't have access to your DNS or hosting provider, you should figure out who in your company has this access before you begin setting up domain authentication.

To set up domain authentication:

1. In the SendGrid UI, select Settings > Sender Authentication.
2. In the domain authentication section, click Get Started.
3. Next, add in information about your DNS host, and indicate whether you also want to set up link branding. Click Next. For more information about link branding, check out What is link branding?.
4. Fill in the domain that you want to send from and add advanced settings as needed. Make sure that you only enter the name of your root domain. Do not include www or http://www in this field. Your domain needs to match the domain of your FROM address on the emails you are sending out. For example, if I am sending an email from example@sendgrid.com, I would set my domain authentication domain to be sendgrid.com. Click Next. For more information about advanced settings, see Advanced settings.
5. Next, you need to add all of the CNAME records on this screen to your DNS host. This process varies depending on your DNS host. For videos on how to add your CNAME to some popular DNS service providers, check out these videos. If you don't have access to modify your companies DNS records, you can also email a request to a co-worker. This email includes a direct link to the CNAME records. This link does expire. The recipient doesn't need login access to your SendGrid account.

It can take up to 48 hours for the records to verify after you upload them into your DNS host, so you will likely have to come back later to verify.

Verifying your DNS

Once you add the CNAME records to your DNS host, return to the Sender authentication page and click Verify.

For more information, please click here.