How does TriBuild CM send out emails?
TriBuild Construction Management sends email from our mail servers on your behalf to the recipients of your emails, such as sending a RFI request email. As multiple companies use our servers, there is a risk that some of your emails may get bounced or not delivered due to certain spam rules set at the receiver’s end.
Sender Policy Framework (SPF)
To reduce the risk of undelivered emails, we recommend adding a Sender Policy Framework (SPF) record to your DNS settings to avoid the email from being blocked or bounced. SPF records are a powerful anti-abuse tool that protects you from fraudulent entities disguising their emails as yours, and a SPF record helps large mail servers such as Google and Microsoft establish the reputation of domains, thereby improving the deliverability of your emails. Authentication is the mode for ensuring that an email isn’t forged. TriBuild CM does this automatically with all emails sent through our servers. Adding DNS records to your domain will allow us to send and digitally sign your emails.
Should I attempt this on my own?
The Sender Policy Framework (SPF) attempts to control forged email by giving domain owners a way to specify which email sources are legitimate for their domains and which ones aren’t. This is recommended for people with advanced knowledge of systems and domain administration. As such we strongly recommend you to engage with your Domain Administrator or IT consultant before undertaking these changes.
Have an Email Setup Partner do it for you
If you don’t have the knowledge to do this yourself, then we recommend our email set up partner do it for you.
Advanced
Create an SPF TXT Record
You can add an SPF record to your Domain Name System (DNS) zone as a text (TXT) record. The SPF record is associated with your domain and specifies which mail server or servers the domain uses to send email.
Considerations for setting the SPF
To correctly set the SPF for your domain, answer the following questions:
Question: From what server or servers will email from the domain originate?
Answer: TriBuild Construction Management mail servers use the tribuildprojects.com domain.
Create an SPF rule
The example in this section assumes that you have the following considerations for your email on a specific domain:
The authorized servers are your cloud server (that is, the incoming mail exchange (MX) details also send mail). See specific help articles from main providers:
No other servers are authorized.
In this situation, you would create the following rule and add it to a TXT record:
v=spf1 mx include:_spf.tribuildprojects.com -all
The following list shows how each part of the record is defined:
v=spf1: Sets the SPF version that is used.
mx: Allows the domain’s MX details to send email.
_spf. tribuildprojects.com: Includes TriBuild CM mail servers as authorized servers.
-all: Indicates that servers that are not listed previously are not authorized to send email. If an unauthorized server does send email, action is taken according to the receiving mail server’s own policy. For example, the email is deleted or marked as spam.
About the all setting
The all setting is an important aspect of the record and has the following basic markers:
-all: Any server that is not previously listed is not authorized to send email.
~all: If mail is received from a server that is not previously listed, it is marked as a soft fail, which allows the email to be scrutinized further.
Add an SPF TXT record
To add an SPF TXT record, use the following steps:
Log in to the DNS control panel for your domain host
Select TXT Record for the record type.
Enter the rule in the Text area. For example, enter v=spf1 mx -all to indicate that all email is sent from this server and no other mail servers are authorized.
Specify the Time to Live (TTL).
Add Record.
Please note the following
This is a proactive move to mitigate Spam related issues so that you can email from TriBuild CM effectively. How the steps above are added differs with every domain service provider. You will also have to contact them. TriBuild CM only assists you with providing the settings that need to be updated in your domain service provider.
For assistance we recommend you deal with our email setup partner who can do the work for you.