Constant Contact setup via EasySPF & Managed DKIM
Constant Contact is an email marketing platform. If you are using Constant Contact to send emails on your domain’s behalf, you should set up a DKIM record to ensure your emails are sent from your domain.
Constant Contact SPF Record Configuration
Note: There is no need to set up a SPF record for Constant Contact, as the "Envelope From" domain will always be handled by the server of Constant Contact. For SPF to be aligned, you should have your “From address” domain in the “Envelope From” address. Constant Contact always handles the "Envelope From" domain. During the DMARC check, this "Envelope From" domain will not match with your “From address” domain, so SPF alignment will fail. This happens not only with Constant Contact but with the majority of Email Service Providers. Sometimes, you’ll be suggested to add “include:spf.constantcontact.com” to your SPF record, but by doing this, you won’t achieve alignment. Instead, you’ll just whitelist the IP addresses of Constant Contact, simply wasting precious DNS lookups.
In case you add the include provided from Constant Contact to your SPF record, your SPF record will look like the one below,
v=spf1 include:zoho.com include:mxsspf.sendpulse.com include:spf.constantcontact.com ~all
Just be informed that there is no need to do this, as SPF will fail due to misalignment, even if you add that “include” in your SPF record.
Constant Contact has an article regarding the SPF alignment as well, you can check it out in this link, How do I pass a DMARC check?
DMARC requires either DKIM or SPF to be authenticated and aligned, so you will pass the DMARC check even without SPF alignment. SPF alignment failing won't affect your email deliverability, if you have DKIM in place. Thus you need to set up only DKIM for Constant Contact.
DKIM for Constant Contact
Self-authenticate using DKIM CNAME records
Please follow the instructions below for configuring DKIM with CNAME records.
1. Click the profile name in the upper-right and select My Account
2. Click on the Advanced settings tab.
3. Click on Add self-authentication.
4. Select “Self-authenticate using DKIM CNAME records.” on the popup window.
5. Click on Continue.
6. From the pop-up window, select the domain you want to authenticate. If the domain you want isn’t listed, choose “Select another domain” from the drop-down to add and verify a new email address.
7. Click Continue.
8. Copy and paste those two CNAME records into your Managed DKIM.
Specify the Email Sender—in this case, Constant Contact—then add the three CNAME records. Finally, click the “Add” button; the system will automatically save the configuration.
9. Click Ok once you finish publishing the CNAME records in your Managed DKIM.
10. A popup window will inform you that the implementation takes up to 48 hours. Click on Got it.
11. Click on OK to return to your account.
12. Approximately 24-48 hours after you've published the CNAME records into your DNS settings, click Check status to finish activating your authentication.
13. If you see that it is already ready to activate, click on the Activate button and finish the authentication process.
Important: DMARC compliance for Constant Contact is achieved via DKIM authentication and alignment only. Although you’ve not configured SPF, DMARC will still pass. You can test it with our Email Investigation tool. (See the screenshot below.)