Note: This article covers deliverability issues specific to Japanese mobile carrier ("career") email addresses such as docomo, au, and softbank, which are relevant only to businesses selling to customers in Japan. The information below will not be directly relevant if you are not selling in the Japanese market.
If you run an online store on Shopify, you may run into issues such as "order confirmation emails aren't being delivered" or "an increasing number of customers say they never received an email from us."
This is especially common in Japan, where many customers use carrier email addresses from docomo, au, SoftBank, and other mobile carriers, and deliverability to these addresses frequently fails. Undelivered emails can lead to lower customer satisfaction and lost sales opportunities.
This article explains in detail the challenges of carrier email deliverability on Shopify and concrete solutions. We'll walk through everything from technical settings to practical operational approaches, step by step, so please use this as a reference.
What Is a Career (Carrier) Email Address?
A "career email" address (in Japanese, "career mail," referring to carrier-provided email) is a general term for an email service provided by a mobile phone company (telecom carrier). Specifically, it refers to the email address assigned by a carrier when you sign a mobile phone contract.
Major Carrier Email Addresses
- docomo: ~@docomo.ne.jp
- au: 〜@au.com
- SoftBank: ~@softbank.ne.jp
- Rakuten Mobile: ~@rakumail.jp
These are also provided by sub-brands such as Y!mobile and UQ mobile.
How to Fix the Problem of Career Emails Not Being Delivered on Shopify
It's not uncommon for emails to fail to reach carrier email addresses on Shopify. In this section, we introduce methods to improve deliverability to carrier email addresses as much as possible, reduce orders placed with carrier email addresses, and prohibit orders using carrier email addresses altogether.
Review Your DMARC, DKIM, and SPF Settings
Reviewing whether your DMARC, DKIM, and SPF settings are correct is an extremely important measure for carrier email deliverability. These records prove that the sender of an email is legitimate and help prevent it from being misclassified by spam filters.
Shopify's official help page provides instructions for setting up domain authentication, so domain owners are encouraged to configure these DNS records properly along with the CNAME setup.
Set up your email | Shopify Help Center
Use an Email Delivery App That Reaches Career Emails Well
Source: Dotdigital | Shopify App Store
"Dotdigital," an email delivery app that explicitly advertises carrier-email support, reportedly boasts a higher deliverability rate than competitors because it has its own email delivery infrastructure. It appears to reliably reach carrier email addresses, which are notoriously difficult to deliver to, so it may be worth considering.
The blog article below explains Dotdigital's features, pricing plans, and setup method in detail. Please use it as a reference when considering adoption.
Advise Customers Not to Use Career Emails
Discouraging orders placed with a carrier email address is one approach.
By displaying a message on the checkout page (and elsewhere) noting that carrier email addresses are not recommended, you can reduce the number of orders placed with carrier email addresses, thereby reducing the number of undelivered emails.
How to Display This Message on the Checkout Page
(1) From the Shopify admin, go to "Online Store > Themes."
(2) Click the "⋯" (ellipsis) menu.
(3) Click "Edit default theme content."
(4) On the theme content page, search for "email."
(5) Edit the input field for "Checkout & system > Checkout contact > Email label."
(6) Click "Save."
Restrict Orders So Career Emails Cannot Be Used
Finally, there's the method of prohibiting orders with carrier emails outright. Using the Shopify app "RuffRuff Order Limits," which lets you implement all kinds of purchase restrictions with a single app, you can block orders that use carrier email addresses.
The blog article below explains in detail how to use "RuffRuff Order Limits" to proactively restrict orders placed with carrier email addresses. Please use it as a reference.
RuffRuff Order Limits
Using "RuffRuff Order Limits," a Shopify app developed by a Japanese company that enables a variety of purchase restrictions, you can display an alert message and block an order when a carrier email address is entered at checkout. If you'd rather prevent the deliverability problem from occurring at all, consider adopting this app.
Summary
To address career email deliverability issues on Shopify, it's effective to combine the following three approaches:
1. Technical Measures
- Properly configuring DMARC, DKIM, and SPF
- Using a dedicated email delivery service (such as Dotdigital)
2. Operational Measures
- Displaying messaging on the checkout page discouraging career emails
3. Restriction-Based Measures
- Prohibiting orders with career emails using RuffRuff Order Limits
Which method to choose depends on your shop's policy and customer base. We recommend first reviewing your technical settings, and if that doesn't lead to improvement, gradually considering other measures.
Improving email deliverability directly translates into better communication quality with your customers. By implementing the right measures, you can provide a better customer experience.
