Thinking it seems a little too quiet on your website contact page? If you have an older website that was launched before 2025, it is possible your website is not sending emails correctly.
In some circumstances it may even appear that your contact form is sending emails correctly and displaying a “success” message, but the email never gets delivered. Most of these failures are caused by how the email is sent, not by the form itself.
Since 2024, Google, Yahoo and Outlook have restricted sending emails without proper authentication, and if your website was using a default mailer these emails may be getting blocked.
Here are the most common causes:
1. The website is sending email the “default” way
By default, WordPress uses PHP mail(). It sends unauthenticated email straight from the web server, and most website hosts (including ours) will block this by default.
2. The “From” address is the visitor’s email
Sending from the visitor’s email will look like spam and get blocked by most email providers. Instead, set the From email address as your address and the Reply-To email as the visitor’s.
3. Missing or broken SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records
Your email provider will now require this setup on your domain DNS. If you haven’t updated your email settings in the last few years, these records are likely missing.
4. Email moved to Google Workspace or Microsoft 365, but the web server didn’t get the memo
Did you change from a self-hosted email to a service-provided email? This would block your PHP mail from working, and your website needs to be connected.
5. The form itself is failing
This could be caused by a bad plugin update, outdated email settings, or anti-spam protection failing.
Let us make sure every message gets through
Your website’s contact form is often the first conversation a new customer has with your business. If it’s not working, you may never know what you missed.
368 Durham can diagnose and fix contact form email problems on any WordPress website. We also include email delivery checks in our website maintenance plans, so your form keeps working after updates and changes.
