Sorry about the title gore.
The Problem
I’m having issues getting box.p.nixc.us and box.thereed.web.fund to actually hit peoples inboxes. Both of these are getting high scores on MxToolbox Domain Healthcheck and Mail-Tester.com granted this is not a MIAB setup intended for mass emailing its just for company mail.
Diagnostics
An full page screenshot of the results from https://mxtoolbox.com/domain/box.p.nixc.us/
Spammed email header
Here is the email header of an email that went straight to spam.
Delivered-To: RECEIVERREDACTED@gmail.com
Received: by 10.74.142.2 with SMTP id q2csp1323900ook;
Fri, 16 Feb 2018 22:26:57 -0800 (PST)
X-Google-Smtp-Source: AH8x225avEKd5RlfKZ721dzbL/AY7q5vX1cMqH09C8+m/jNRkelXqtHIEtmNmTw2BZre8MrqZkNz
X-Received: by 10.55.49.74 with SMTP id x71mr13981054qkx.133.1518848817400;
Fri, 16 Feb 2018 22:26:57 -0800 (PST)
ARC-Seal: i=1; a=rsa-sha256; t=1518848817; cv=none;
d=google.com; s=arc-20160816;
b=ShyE7uzvxBDWMzRzmYR4ZH9JW5wjVUBAcKSzy5ItBdD9USx+BQpW8oS2qCKzonwNuE
PcgDX8lDg1U+4KKDaPyAtaxtqgWfOFukNDoTuQNjysU5fgZus3wuz8YUG552T2WE4V7A
TUwxQm1HQMzSVB+BJuRx2w7dO5MN4OhN5YehungKmZkQIF+8qZTKHXAw0zGIIo3f1dyL
YeqRQhDaYx3kaR3DP9XMCoePBSbO9Qwm3fTJS3go6kaw7hJAHIXywC3J4v8mr9tChcBk
QIBEgKaihUE1s5sttg/F0qio0mUEzP9ZdWR4OzGKX0lpyQngB0JDdRjVx5n7Xa26wVac
XZEg==
ARC-Message-Signature: i=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=google.com; s=arc-20160816;
h=message-id:mail-reply-to:reply-to:organization:subject:to:from:date
:content-transfer-encoding:mime-version:dkim-signature
:arc-authentication-results;
bh=xO5An/9aREQUy0S9hD3k5fS+UXHcRQTW4DqIw+tNrYk=;
b=ss6e3ysdxYmnragJykgoI3sLfyZitgvoJVel5nxEah/kUx1zKFQ7mU2+Cele/LvY16
Rm0VkoG2eOTs0Eu0YCGfLJ7P82Ml8oe3RWwieT1fuOtzuFH35KRb/s8xse0AUWbfGOi2
LbWyNTa999cwY6xiHaNcAxAK4EBrApT8fRZd1U89b4Rwg1JjByzMy75sD4lJGmZNReaE
6BE2YMh/JGYQoY4T2EVVieQ08r+A7lkz2mot/ExtrdozxHyJ6fLu4rvXRfuozpC873sK
0J9eTM//0GXmzXjA2UT9AWP7EzLvE3vIY9f2JgLbfllvAw3Syrr2Gr4vXJeNSnkGwYcM
1tEQ==
ARC-Authentication-Results: i=1; mx.google.com;
dkim=pass header.i=@nixc.us header.s=mail header.b=WErqepiU;
spf=pass (google.com: domain of USERREDACTED@nixc.us designates 158.69.222.58 as permitted sender) smtp.mailfrom=USERREDACTED@nixc.us;
dmarc=pass (p=QUARANTINE sp=QUARANTINE dis=NONE) header.from=nixc.us
Return-Path: <USERREDACTED@nixc.us>
Received: from box.p.nixc.us (box.p.nixc.us. [158.69.222.58])
by mx.google.com with ESMTPS id b27si657095qtk.361.2018.02.16.22.26.57
for <RECEIVERREDACTED@gmail.com>
(version=TLS1_2 cipher=ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256 bits=128/128);
Fri, 16 Feb 2018 22:26:57 -0800 (PST)
Received-SPF: pass (google.com: domain of USERREDACTED@nixc.us designates 158.69.222.58 as permitted sender) client-ip=158.69.222.58;
Authentication-Results: mx.google.com;
dkim=pass header.i=@nixc.us header.s=mail header.b=WErqepiU;
spf=pass (google.com: domain of USERREDACTED@nixc.us designates 158.69.222.58 as permitted sender) smtp.mailfrom=USERREDACTED@nixc.us;
dmarc=pass (p=QUARANTINE sp=QUARANTINE dis=NONE) header.from=nixc.us
Received: from authenticated-user (box.p.nixc.us [158.69.222.58]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256 (128/128 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by box.p.nixc.us (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id F19AD95CE for <RECEIVERREDACTED@gmail.com>; Sat, 17 Feb 2018 01:26:56 -0500 (EST)
DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=simple/simple; d=nixc.us; s=mail; t=1518848817; bh=TpELEkQDlxN5KjeQPqJcUfQx8+jG1UTDWo6lpGcsaVM=; h=Date:From:To:Subject:Reply-To:From; b=WErqepiUr/vY2aYgeGQJtFrvebkT1Z31q3SjKAspa/LKmu5Xqsi2pSRYsRT/guK9J
Bm54djYrTMhiwaEkyH3dmnUt1z+aBk2AVCo8XJWerlMd0ruf9DBiBPMxOLeaep8ShF
BQaNQm7piv2fLOOmpR0PNep7218G1tGE3Rc3QVxHAdrurY15cHtOuVdjqggf/5RDOv
/EEwGokXW9kXQ8WmiktvoWHGe7mIi3Ju3whhDtAyocvQBEfkQorhqqArmkHG8P4nWd
hZV+OxTuto0iPfZMEO1DSCgA2HKeGQFPNkNUWLu1FsMvU1bcGWYPHwxTQ60rtoD8+H
qCclCf4pgx4uQ==
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Date: Sat, 17 Feb 2018 06:26:56 +0000
From: FIRST LAST <USERREDACTED@nixc.us>
To: RECEIVERREDACTED@gmail.com
Subject: I think that google is really just a bully.
Organization: Nixius
Reply-To: USERREDACTED@nixc.us
Mail-Reply-To: USERREDACTED@nixc.us
Message-ID: <a5ea1f7b3d8734be8b4c378448e4d5db@nixc.us>
X-Sender: USERREDACTED@nixc.us
They just really seem to want a monopoly on this email game.
--
_Thanks,_
~ USERREDACTED
Conclusion
At this point, after investigating as much as possible adding my domain nixc.us which I’ve owned for years to https://postmaster.google.com/ and getting everything set up on both CloudFlare and Locally depending on the domain I have two trying out two configurations to see if I could hit inboxes. I’ve discovered that basically, Google is anti-competitive when it comes to host your own mail providers. Which leads me to believe that basically the internet can’t be trusted to do email or Google just wants you using their services. I’m usually a huge Google supporter but today, not so much.
I’ve owned nixc.us from: Apr 6, 2016 - Sep 24, 2018
web.fund has been registered since: Jul 15, 2016 - Jul 16, 2018
Neither of these should be considered as “new” domains. Granted I acquired web.fund via some auction last summer which means it was transferred internally at my registrar.