How to Understand and Manage Email Bounce Backs – Stampede AI

In email communication, understanding bounce backs is crucial for maintaining a healthy email list and improving delivery rates. Bounce backs are categorised into hard and soft bounces. A hard bounce is a permanent failure, often due to invalid email addresses, domain issues, or blocked emails, and these addresses are automatically removed from your list. Conversely, a soft bounce is a temporary failure, possibly due to full mailboxes, server issues, or large emails, and these addresses remain on your list for future attempts. Recognising these differences helps in managing email communications effectively and maintaining a positive sender reputation.

In the realm of email communication, it's quite normal to come across bounce backs. Knowing the difference between a "hard bounce" and a "soft bounce" can assist you in keeping a healthy email list and enhancing your email delivery rates. In this article, we’ll look into what hard and soft bounces are, along with some examples to help you distinguish between the two easily.

What is an Email Bounce Back?

An email bounce back happens when an email fails to reach the recipient's inbox. The email server sends a message back to the sender explaining why the email couldn't be delivered. Bounce backs can be divided into two main categories: hard bounce and soft bounce.

Hard Bounce

A hard bounce is a permanent delivery failure, meaning that the email cannot be delivered to the recipient's inbox. The main reasons for a hard bounce include:

Invalid Email Address: The email address doesn’t exist. For instance, you meant to send an email to hello11@example.com but accidentally typed hello1@example.com.
Domain Issues: The domain name does not exist or is currently unavailable.
Blocked Email: The recipient's server has blocked the sender's IP or email address.

Examples of Hard Bounce

Sending an email to a non-existent email address: user1234@nonexistentdomain.com

Typographical errors in the email address: johndoe@gmial.com instead of johndoe@gmail.com

Note: Stampede automatically removes email addresses that cause hard bounces from your list, as these addresses definitely do not exist, helping to keep your email list in good shape.

Soft Bounce

A soft bounce is a temporary delivery failure, indicating that although the email address is valid, the email cannot be delivered at that moment but might be deliverable later. The main reasons for a soft bounce include:

Mailbox is Full: The recipient's mailbox has reached its storage limit and cannot accept new emails until some space is freed up.
Server Issues: The recipient's email server is temporarily down or facing technical difficulties.
Email Message Issues: The email message is too large or contains attachments that are too big for the recipient's server to accept.

Examples of Soft Bounce

Sending an email to a full inbox: hello@example.com where the recipient's mailbox has exceeded its storage capacity.

Email server downtime: A temporary issue with the recipient's email server, preventing it from processing incoming emails.

Note: Even though soft bounces are due to temporary issues, Stampede keeps these email addresses in your list, as they may successfully receive future emails once the problems are sorted out.

Conclusion

Grasping the differences between hard and soft bounce backs can help you manage your email communications more effectively. By paying attention to the type of bounce back and the reasons given, you can take the right steps to ensure successful email delivery in the future. Keep an eye on your bounce-back rates and adjust your email strategy as necessary to maintain a positive sender reputation.