How to update an SPF record for your custom domain

Sometimes, WSB automated emails from custom sending domains don’t reach attendees and land in the Spam folder. This problem may be caused by an incorrectly configured SPF record.

For WSB notifications to be delivered correctly, an SPF record for your domain should include SparkPost (our email provider) as an authorized sender.

Attention. If you don't have an SPF record but messages are still not delivered, the problem lies elsewhere. There is no need to create an SPF record from scratch in this case. Please contact our support team so we could investigate the problem.

What is SPF and why do I need it?

SPF (Sender Policy Framework) is the protective mechanism for your email domain, telling the recipients that your emails are safe and authorized by a sender. SPF protects you from spoofing (when someone uses your email to send spam messages) and prevents your emails from landing in the Spam folder.

Where can I find an SPF record?

SPF record is added to the DNS record of your domain provider (e.g. GoDaddy, Hostgator, Bluehost, Dreamhost, Cloudflare, etc.).

You need to log into your domain account and navigate to the section for managing DNS records.

How to edit an SPF record

SPF record is a simple TXT file that usually looks like this:

mydomain.net TXT "v=spf1 ip4: 192.168.17.43 ip6: 2DAB:FFFF:0000:3EAE:01AA:00FF:DD72:2C4A include:_spf.google.com ~all"

or like this:

mydomain.net TXT "v=spf1 include:_spf.google.com ~all"

It can look a little bit different depending on your domain provider.

Let’s break down the examples above:

Mydomain.net - your domain name
TXT - the file format, used for SPF records
v=spf1 - the tag indicating that the following string is an SPF record
ip4/ip6 - defines which IP addresses are authorized to send emails from your domain
include:_spf.google.com - defines which email providers are authorized to send emails from this domain.
~all - indicates that all other IP addresses or email providers (different from the ones you defined at the previous point) are suspicious.
By adding ~all, you tell the receiving side to mark as Spam all incoming emails from unauthorized providers.
If you add -all to your record instead, all emails from unauthorized providers will be rejected.

How to add SparkPost to my SPF record?

You simply need to add the following line to the record: "include:sparkpostmail.com", then save it.

Let's see how it will look with 2 examlples above:

mydomain.net TXT "v=spf1 ip4: 192.168.17.43 ip6: 2DAB:FFFF:0000:3EAE:01AA:00FF:DD72:2C4A include:_spf.google.com include:sparkpostmail.com ~all"

and

mydomain.net TXT "v=spf1 include:_spf.google.com include:sparkpostmail.com ~all"

With SparkPost added to the record, WSB emails should be delivered to your attendees without any issues.

Where can I find out how to edit an SPF record for my domain host?

They usually have the relevant articles in their knowledge centers. We've collected for you the links to the most popular email providers and domain hosts: