Learn about Marketing Cloud Engagement allowlisting and email messaging.
What Is Allowlisting
Allowlisting helps ensure that email sends and API calls from trusted sources are accepted and processed.
Allowlist calls are made from within our application and sent outbound to clients. Our cloud-based application exists within our data centers. If a special function is required to pull data that is located outside of these platforms, our servers make these requests. We have hundreds of servers that perform such requests through a specific set of monitored proxy addresses for security reasons.
Some spam filters are smarter than others, and allowlisting isn’t always necessary. Skip this process until or unless you find that you have an issue receiving copies of your own email messages. This process only applies to how spam filters work when sending emails messages from yourself to yourself. These instructions specifically refer to clients sending messages to themselves.
Most importantly, don't spam. Permission is the key to the inbox. Companies who send mail only to recipients who have explicitly requested to receive that mail are the most successful at getting their email messages delivered.
Engagement provides the tools and expertise to measure your current deliverability and help you investigate and fix any problems. Contact your Engagement relationship manager to enable these features or for more information.
Why Allowlist Engagement IP Addresses
Your servers can interact with Engagement applications for several different reasons.
- You use Marketing Cloud Engagement API to create and send your email and SMS messages
- You use Marketing Cloud Engagement for Microsoft Dynamics CRM integration
- You use Marketing Cloud Connector for Marketing Cloud Engagement
To properly use the API or the integrations, allowlist Engagement server IP addresses to allow uninterrupted communication. Because server configurations are unique to each instance, apply them according to your system.
Previously, email messages with your From address or domain were probably only sent from a mail server on your internal network. Spam filters only expect that email from your domain comes from this existing, internal mail server. Some email messages can claim to be from you, but actually come from any server outside your network. These messages are more likely to be blocked as a spam, spoof, or phishing email. Some filters reject email messages that have the same domain name in both the From and To addresses in the headers. These filters especially target these types of messages when they don't originate from your internal network.
Spammers have a history of dressing up their email messages to look like they originated from somewhere they didn't. Many companies protect themselves by allowing email from their own domain through only if it comes from the company's mail servers. Otherwise, a spammer could create an email message appearing to come from your CEO.