SMTP Monitoring with NodePing

2023/08/22 by Leave a comment

In the world of email communication, Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) plays a crucial role in ensuring the seamless delivery of messages. However, like any other technology, SMTP is not immune to issues that can disrupt email flow and affect business operations. To maintain a healthy and reliable email infrastructure, it is essential to monitor SMTP servers continuously. In this blog post, we will explore how NodePing can be used to monitor for SMTP functionality, packet loss, blacklisting, deferred queues, and MX/SPF records.

NodePing is a versatile and powerful server monitoring service that allows businesses to monitor their infrastructure’s performance and uptime. With its extensive range of monitoring checks, NodePing provides an excellent solution for monitoring SMTP servers and ensuring they are operating optimally.

Monitoring SMTP Functionality

Verifying the functionality of your incoming SMTP server is crucial to ensure that it can receive emails without any hiccups. NodePing’s SMTP check allows you to periodically test your SMTP server by trying to send a test email to a designated email address. If the test email is accepted, it indicates that your SMTP server is functioning correctly. In case of failures, like timeouts or server errors, NodePing will promptly alert you, enabling you to troubleshoot and rectify the issues.

Monitoring Packet Loss

Packet loss can severely impact the performance of your SMTP server and lead to email delivery delays or failures. NodePing’s ICMP PING check is a valuable tool to monitor packet loss and routing issues to to your SMTP server. By regularly performing ping tests, you can assess packet loss trends and determine whether network-related issues are affecting your email delivery. If a failure is seen, NodePing automated diagnostics will send you MTR results so you can quickly troubleshoot where the issue originates. Addressing packet loss problems promptly will lead to a smoother email experience for your users.

Monitoring SMTP Blacklisting

Blacklisting can be detrimental to email delivery, as it prevents messages from reaching their intended recipients. NodePing’s RBL check allows you to monitor your SMTP server’s IP addresses against popular DNS-based blacklists (RBLs) such as Spamhaus and Barracuda. By configuring blacklisting checks at regular intervals, you can quickly identify if your server’s IP addresses have been blacklisted, enabling you to take immediate action to resolve the issue and maintain a good sender reputation.

Monitoring Deferred Queues

When your SMTP server is unable to deliver emails to the recipient’s mailbox immediately, it sits in the deferred queue. If emails in your deferred queues are piling up, you likely have a delivery issue. NodePing’s PUSH check can watch your deferred queues and send you notifications if they rise above what you’re comfortable with; allowing you to investigate and resolve the underlying problems before they escalate.

Monitoring MX Records

MX (Mail Exchange) DNS records play a crucial role in email delivery by specifying the mail servers responsible for receiving emails for a domain. NodePing’s DNS check allows you to monitor the MX records of your domain to ensure they are correctly configured and that your DNS servers are responding with those records properly. Regular checks of MX records help you keep incoming mail flowing.

Monitoring SPF Record

Your SPF record is actually a TXT DNS record that specifies which servers are allowed to send email from your domain. If that record is missing, compromised, or your DNS servers aren’t responding, sending email may be blocked or delayed. NodePing’s DNS check will make sure your SPF record is available and hasn’t been hacked. That will keep your outgoing mail flowing.

In conclusion, email monitoring is essential to ensure the reliability and efficiency of your message communications. NodePing provides a comprehensive suite of checks that empower you to monitor for blacklisting, SMTP functionality, packet loss, deferred queues, along with MX and SPF records. By leveraging NodePing’s monitoring capabilities, you can proactively identify and address issues affecting your SMTP server’s availability and performance, leading to better email deliverability and improved customer satisfaction.

Remember, a robust email infrastructure is the backbone of modern businesses, and investing in reliable monitoring tools like NodePing with automated diagnostics is a step towards a smoother and more efficient communication system.

Start monitoring your SMTP servers with NodePing today by signing up for our free, 15-day trial and stay one step ahead of any potential email delivery challenges!

Filed under DNS, Email, Monitoring, PING, SMTP, uptime Tagged with , , , , , , , , , ,

Custom Email Branding in NodePing

2023/07/25 by Leave a comment

NodePing is pretty popular with hosting service providers and marketing companies that want to keep an eye on their customer’s websites and other Internet-facing services. One of the features they often use is to send NodePing email alerts from one of their own branded email addresses. Uptime alerts with your own ‘from’ email, like ‘support@examplecompany.com’, is a great way to keep brand recognition and increase cohesion with your customers and allows those customers to respond to alerts directly to your support system, not NodePing.

Setting a custom ‘from’ email address for NodePing email notifications is easy. You only need to:

  • Change the ‘from’ email in your branding settings
  • Update your SPF record to include NodePing’s SMTP servers

Email Templates

To change the ‘from’ email address for notifications, login to your NodePing account and navigate to Account Settings -> Branding. In the Notifications section, you’ll see there are 4 different email templates:

  • First
  • Up
  • Down
  • Diagnostic

You’ll need to modify the ‘From’ email address in each of those and click on the corresponding “Save…” button for each of the 4 email templates. It may take up to 10 minutes for those settings to take effect.

SPF Record

Your SPF record is a DNS record that tells email services where email from your domain is allowed to be sent from. If you try to send email from a server that isn’t in your SPF, there’s a good chance that email is going to get rejected or marked as spam. It’s basically a whitelist of IP addresses that are allowed to send email with your domain in the ‘from’ field.

If you don’t modify your SPF record, there’s an increased chance notification emails will bounce or be marked as spam. Let’s add the NodePing SMTP servers to your domain’s SPF record to increase deliverability. Modifying that special TXT DNS record usually happens at your domain registrar or DNS provider. You’ll need to login there and edit the existing SPF record. If one doesn’t exist, you’ll want to create one.

If you have an existing SPF record, you can add the following to it:

include:spf.nodeping.com

Sometimes an example is the best way to see how this modification is done. Below is an SPF record before adding the NodePing entry.

"v=spf1 include:_spf.google.com include:sendgrid.net ~all"

And now that same SPF record with the NodePing entry added to it.

"v=spf1 include:_spf.google.com include:sendgrid.net include:spf.nodeping.com ~all"

It doesn’t matter which order you put the NodePing entry in, so long as it’s after the ‘v=spf1’ part and before the ‘all’ part. Those need to bookend a valid SPF record.

Once that record is saved and propagated through DNS, your contacts should be able to receive NodePing alerts with your very own ‘from’ email address on them.

Customizing your NodePing email notifications is a great way to increase brand recognition and cohesion with your customers. With NodePing, you’ll be the first to know when services are offline. Quick detection means quick resolution and more uptime.

If you don’t yet have a NodePing account, please consider signing up for our free, 15-day trial. See for yourself why those who know, use fast, reliable, and affordable NodePing.

Filed under Email, Using NodePing Tagged with , ,