Overview
Use lookalike domains to protect your primary domain and improve email deliverability when you reach out to contacts on Apollo. A lookalike domain isn't the same as your company's primary operating domain, but it's a domain that most casual observers would affiliate with your primary domain. For example, if apollo.io is Apollo's primary domain, Apollo might choose to create a lookalike domain like heyapollo.io or meetapollo.io.
You might use lookalike domains for different regions or countries in which you operate, to protect your brand, or for campaign-specific outreach.
When you send cold emails from a lookalike domain, you help protect the sending reputation of your primary domain and reduce the risk of negatively impacting the deliverability of your company's regular operational email.
If your team consistently follows email deliverability best practices with compelling messaging that's optimized to drive engagement with your contacts, it's safe to send messages with a tracking subdomain when doing outreach on Apollo. However if you aren't there yet, Apollo strongly recommends that you create and use lookalike domains to protect the sending reputation of your primary corporate domain.
Did you know? If you need a lookalike domain, you can generate domains and mailboxes directly on Apollo. Customize your domain, assign email addresses to team members, and reach out — with no costly or complicated set up required!
Check out the following sections to learn more about setting up lookalike domains for your cold outreach on Apollo.
Lookalike Best Practices
Although a lookalike domain isolates your primary domain from the damage that poor targeting, content, and sending practices can have on your sending reputation, you should still follow best practices with your lookalike domain.
It takes very little time to burn a sending reputation, but recovering or rebuilding it on another domain is a slow, difficult process.
Check out these best practices to protect the reputation of your lookalike domain:
| Tip | Put it to practice |
|---|---|
| Don't use more domains than necessary | When a mailbox provider sees the same message coming from many different domains, it can resemble snowshoe spamming, where a spammer spreads messages across multiple domains and IPs to avoid being caught. |
| Allow your new domain to age |
Spammers often register new domains and immediately start spamming through them. Almost all filtering systems will flag a domain as potential spam if it's less than a month old. Wait 30 days before you send any emails from this domain, and then begin sending emails slowly. Use email warmup to prime your new domain for outreach, then start real outreach by sending 10 emails daily. Monitor open and click rates for a time-bound test, and after a few weeks, if your emails are performing well, slowly increase the number of emails you send and deactivate email tracking until you're ready for other specific campaigns. Remember not to exceed Apollo's recommended email sending limits per mailbox. |
| Publish a website on your lookalike domain | A simple landing page will suffice. Filters do automated vetting on a domain, including looking for a website. |
| Avoid using DNS privacy | It's a common spammer practice to hide behind anonymized registrars. As a result, if you register your domain with anonymized contact information, servers are more likely to treat you as a spammer. Transparency pays off here. |
| Authenticate your domain |
Whitelabel everything to ensure all URLs in your messages and on your landing page link back to the lookalike domain and not your main domain. Use a custom tracking link for the domain. Set up SPF, DKIM, and DMARC to authenticate the domain and ensure your messages land in inboxes. |
Apollo advises against forwarding visitors from your landing page to your main company website. Additionally, you should avoid embedding links or images that redirect users to your primary domain. Doing so links the reputations of both domains, which undermines the goal of using a separate, lookalike domain specifically for cold outreach.
Set Up a Lookalike Domain
To set up a new lookalike domain:
- Create a lookalike: Every domain provider has a different domain creation workflow. If you already have a domain provider, reach out to them or use their support center for help:
Alternatively, use Apollo to generate a new lookalike domain without switching apps. Own, manage, and create mailboxes for the lookalike right on Apollo.
- Create a new mailbox: When you've set up a new domain, create a professional email address using your new domain. Reach out to your mailbox provider or use their support center:
Alternatively, use Apollo to generate mailboxes for a new lookalike without switching apps. Own, manage, and assign mailboxes to your team right on Apollo.
You have now created a new lookalike domain.
Link Your New Mailbox to Apollo
If you used Apollo to generate a new lookalike domain, you can assign mailboxes to your team immediately.
If you used a domain provider to set up a lookalike domain, link the associated mailboxes to Apollo and follow the mailbox configuration steps:
- Set up your email signature: Add custom branding and your unique sign-off to each email you send on Apollo.
- Configure email limits: Set a maximum number of emails you can send from each connected mailbox to avoid damaging your reputation.
- Configure an opt-out link: Give email recipients an easy way to decline future emails, so they don't send you to spam.
- Authenticate your domain: Ensure your DNS records are properly configured so mailbox providers recognize your domain as legitimate.
With your mailbox linked and your configuration complete, you're ready to create a sequence and enroll contacts.
Outreach Best Practices
| Tip | Put it to practice |
|---|---|
| Don't link back to your primary domain from within your emails | Avoid linking to or including images hosted at your main corporate site. You must isolate the reputation of the lookalike domain from your primary domain. You don't want automated link followers to add your main corporate domain to the reputation that the sends from your lookalike domain generate. |
| Use different email templates for each domain | If you set up several lookalike domains and use the exact same messaging across each one, you risk aggregating your sending reputation across domains. This is because servers apply fingerprinting tactics to evaluate how recipients treat your messages. Data points include your domain and IP, the URLs in your messages, and the general structure of the messages you send. When you send the same message across multiple domains, you also risk being flagged for snowshoe spamming. |
| Avoid spray and pray messages | Optimizing for engagement is key. Follow email best practices and avoid the common mistakes of inauthentic personalization. Resist the temptation of gathering a large list and bulk-sending all your contacts the same generic message. Instead, focus on clearly identifying your ideal customer profile, using search filters to segment your contacts. Then enroll them into sequences with highly targeted messaging that speaks to their specific goals and needs. |
| Rotate mailboxes to increase your daily reach | When you add contacts to a sequence, enable Rotate mailboxes to rotate email sending between all the mailboxes you use on Apollo. |
Avoid sending from multiple domains within a single sequence. This can create confusion in reputation tracking.
Next Steps
Want to get the most out of your lookalike domain strategy? These resources will help you scale safely and smartly.
| Email Tracking Overview | Understand how to manage open and click tracking to fine-tune performance and protect your domain’s sending reputation over time. |
|---|---|
| Use Email Warmup to Improve Email Deliverability | Gradually warm up your mailbox to build trust with mail servers before you ramp up outreach volume. |
| Email Sending Limits Overview | Stay within safe thresholds when you configure daily sending limits for each mailbox to avoid triggering spam filters. |
| How Do I Write Effective Sales Emails? | Use proven tactics to craft messaging that earns replies and helps maintain high sender reputation across domains. |
| Configure Your Unsubscribe Email Link | Quickly add opt-out links to your outreach so contacts can easily unsubscribe instead of reporting you as spam. |