Freelancer here: built a free email checker after a WordPress client kept losing leads to spam
Recently had a client on Microsoft 365 who kept getting calls from leads and customers saying they never received emails from his website... quote requests, contact form messages, that kind of thing.
His Outlook mail was landing fine so he assumed email worked. Turned out WordPress wasn't sending through Outlook at all.
Hosting support was not able to help him. So email was going out through his shared hosting panel and IP... no proper authentication on that path. Those messages were hitting spam or vanishing and he had no idea until people started calling.
That's the trap I keep seeing: mailbox email and website email are two different send paths. Gmail/Outlook can look perfect while your site quietly fails. And yep, I know it can get easily confusing.
So I built a free checker: https://doesmyemail.work
- First a quick domain scan: checks SPF, DKIM, DMARC, MX from public DNS. Plain-English results, no signup.
- Second, a companion WordPress plugin, sends a real test through
wp_mail()(contact forms, WooCommerce, etc.) and grades what actually gets delivered.
Plugin: https://wordpress.org/plugins/does-my-email-work/
Field Study
I also ran a field study on 4,673 small businesses across 16 US/Canadian cities. More than half had incomplete email authentication and About 4 in 5 could be impersonated.
Full data and breakdown by industry/city: https://doesmyemail.work/research/state-of-small-business-email-usa-canada-june-2026/
My ask
I realize this is self-promotion so I am posting on a Friday and hope that's alright, as I am new here.
I want this usable for non-technical owners, not just IT people. Trying to keep as much jargon away and make it seem nice and friendly.
Yes, I am ultimately aiming to sell a fix-up service and use the tool for lead generation, but it is otherwise genuinely free with no signup and no obligation.
If you try it:
- Does the design feel trustworthy or sketchy?
- Is the flow obvious, or did you get stuck anywhere?
- After the scan, does the wording make sense, or still jargon?
And if you've lived something like my client's story... leads saying they never received email, everything "looked fine" on your end, I'd love to hear it in the comments. How did you figure out what was broken?