Handling SURBL Blacklisting for Redirected Microsoft Email Domains Used in Cold Email Campaigns
Hey everyone, this isn't Clay related but figured folks here might've hit this before, so wanted to ask. We recently bought a couple of microsoft email domains from a well-known provider for cold emailing, warmed them up for 30-40 days, and within a day or two of launching the campaign we got blacklisted by SURBL. The odd part is our emails have zero links in them. Double checked through the sending platform, nothing there. Still got flagged. Has anyone dealt with this before? Curious what actually worked for you to get delisted, and if there's anything specific SURBL looks for beyond just links (maybe something in headers, content patterns, sending behavior, etc). Now we're looking at the SURBL delisting request, and there are two questions that are tripping us up:
- 1.
Description of the website and organization
- 2.
How the website isn't being advertised through unsolicited messages
Here's the tricky part: these domains do have redirects set up to our main company website. So even though the emails themselves have no links, the domain itself technically points somewhere. Wondering how others have approached these two questions when there's a redirect involved. Do you describe the destination site honestly and explain the redirect's purpose, or do you frame the domain purely as a sending identity and leave the redirect out? Trying to figure out the right way to answer this so it holds up if they check the domain themselves, rather than just writing something that sounds good on paper. Any tips or war stories appreciated 🙏

