How do I add an email address or alias for my sending domain?

What’s in this article

Learn how to add an email address or alias to your account to send emails from a sending domain.

What is an email subdomain?

In order to be able to send from your sending domain you will need to create an email address. You will be able to send from any email address at a domain verified in your Patch account. For example, if you add and verify the domain “email.widgets.com,” you can create an email address such as hello@email.widgets.com. 

Once you have this set up you will see this listed in the Send From dropdown in your Send Settings within our Email Editor.

You can create a new 'Send From' Email Address by clicking the (+) sign in the lower right corner.

Then, fill in the the information in the box, based on the following:

Domain Name: Select the subdomain from the dropdown list that you just added to the account. 

Prefix: Enter the Prefix for the email, this is what comes before the @ symbol.

Name: Give this Send From Email Address a Name for easy reference later. 

Forward to: Then enter the email address that you want this to forward to.

Then click Save & Close.

You will now see this Email Address in the Send From dropdown on the Send Settings tab of the Email Editor. 

How does having separate subdomains help?

Your email domain plays a big role in your sender reputation. Since they are one of the indicators of where a message is coming from, ISPs keep track of your domain reputation. 

Email subdomains are great for isolating variables since ISPs don't explain exactly how they decide whether a sender is trustworthy.

To track and manage reputation, you should create separate email subdomains within your email program.

It's less likely that a rise in spam complaints or a big swing in send volume will affect your root or subdomain if they're separate.

Don't let any email marketing mistakes get in the way of your root domain reputation, which can affect deliverability for PR, sales, or other team members who send personal or outreach emails from the root domain.

How many subdomains do I need?

You'd have multiple subdomains if you want to separate email types like promotional and transactional. You'd have one if you want to separate from the root domain.

Does it work if I just send from different email addresses at the same domain?

If you change the name before the @ in an email address, that's not the same thing as using a subdomain. For example, marketing@widgets.com and help@widgets.com share the same domain.

Changing the names before the @ helps you organize your senders, but since it isn't actually a separate subdomain, sending activity from each person impacts the rest of the senders as well. Therefore, if you want to compartmentalize sending to protect deliverability, this won't work.

How do I set up a subdomain?

Email service providers (ESPs) have different instructions for setting up new email subdomains, so ask your account manager, support team, or the platform's help docs for more info.

Click here to learn more.

It's important to keep best practices in mind, though.

1. Get the new subdomain set up with email authentication.
2. You need to warm up new subdomains just like new IPs because inbox providers see them as unknowns.
3. Include links to your root domain in your emails.
4. Rules should be set up for subdomain email addresses so replies come to a monitored inbox.
5. In case people type it in their browser, redirect subdomains to your root domain.