Cold email

Cold Email Infrastructure for Agencies: Client Setup

How an agency sets up cold email infrastructure per client: separate domains and mailboxes, sizing, a 21-day onboarding runbook, billing, API and offboarding.

Max Korolev
Max KorolevFounder & CEO, Outreach2dayPublished 9 min read
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Cold email infrastructure for an agency is the same stack a single company uses (sending domains, mailboxes, warm-up and a sending tool), repeated once per client and kept apart. Each client gets its own domains, its own mailboxes and its own workspace, so one client's list or copy does not drag down another client's domains. Plan three weeks from the first order to full volume for every new client.

We make Outreach2day, cold email infrastructure with one free workspace per client. This guide covers the setup any agency needs, with our numbers where they apply. For the layers themselves, start with the cold email infrastructure guide.

Why Agencies Separate Every Client

Receiving providers judge a sender by its domain. Google's sender guidelines say Gmail "tracks volume, feedback, and limits per domain and IP address" and that "DKIM and SPF quotas are specific to your domain." If two clients send from the same domain, the client with the weaker list sets the reputation for both.

Separate per client:

  • Domains. No domain sends for two clients. A client's domains carry only that client's campaigns.

  • Mailboxes. Mailboxes sit on their client's domains, up to 5 per domain. See mailboxes per domain.

  • Workspace. One workspace per client keeps domains, mailboxes, reply threads and analytics apart, so reports and offboarding touch one client only.

Domain separation does not isolate the sending IPs. Google's same page says "The activity of any senders using a shared IP address affects the reputation of all senders for that shared IP address." When one client's results drop, check whether other clients on the same IPs dropped too before you blame the domain. The burned domain answer walks through that test.

Who Owns the Domains: Client or Agency

Decide this before the first purchase. It sets who pays for renewals and what happens when the client leaves.

Model

Who pays

Registrant

When the client leaves

Client owns the domains

The client, at their registrar

The client

The client keeps them; you disconnect

Agency buys, client is the registrant

The agency, rebilled to the client

The client's contact details

Domains go to the client

Agency buys and keeps them

The agency

The agency

The client starts again on new domains

In Outreach2day, domains bought in the app are registered for one year with the registrant contact details you enter. Enter the client's details if the client should own them. The domains belong to the registrant, and support moves them to the owner's own Namecheap account on request. Domains a client already owns connect by pointing their nameservers to ours; the change takes 24 to 48 hours.

Renewal is not automatic. A domain that expires stops its mailboxes, so put renewal dates for every client in your own calendar.

Size Each Client Before You Buy

Work backwards from the client's daily cold volume:

  1. Mailboxes = cold emails per day ÷ 25 (up to 25 cold emails per mailbox a day, not counting warm-up).

  2. Domains = mailboxes ÷ 5 (up to 5 mailboxes per domain).

  3. Round both up. Add a spare domain or two for replacements.

The cold email capacity calculator does the arithmetic for any volume.

Cost per Client at Three Sizes

Outreach2day charges $2.50 per mailbox a month (list price), with warm-up, the sending engine, the reply inbox and per-mailbox analytics included. Domains are $13 a year for a .com and $5 for a .info, plus a card processing fee on domain purchases. The minimum order is 12 mailboxes ($30 a month).

Client size

Cold emails a day

Mailboxes

Domains

Mailboxes a month

.com domains a year

First year (.com)

Small

300

12

3

$30

$39

$399

Medium

500

20

4

$50

$52

$652

Large

1,000

40

8

$100

$104

$1,304

The arithmetic: 300 ÷ 25 = 12 mailboxes, 12 ÷ 5 = 2.4, rounded up to 3 domains; 12 × $2.50 = $30 a month, 3 × $13 = $39 a year, 12 × $30 + $39 = $399. The same method gives the other rows. Card fees and spare domains are not included. With .info domains the domain column drops to $15, $20 and $40.

The client pays for about three weeks of warm-up before full volume. Put that in the proposal so the first invoice is not a surprise.

How to Onboard a New Client

Run the same steps for every client. The timeline assumes you order on day 1.

  1. Agree the daily volume. Take the client's target meetings, their past emails-per-meeting if they have it, and turn it into a daily cold volume. Size mailboxes and domains from it as above.

  2. Create a workspace for the client. One workspace per client. Name it after the client so reports and invoices match.

  3. Buy or connect the domains. Buy new domains with the registrant details you agreed, or connect the client's own by pointing nameservers. Use variations of the client's brand; see domains for cold email for naming and extensions. Never send from the client's main domain (why).

  4. Create the mailboxes. Up to 5 per domain, with real sender names from the client's team. New mailboxes are ready within 24 hours. SPF, DKIM, DMARC and the redirect to the client's website are set up for you.

  5. Start warm-up and wait 14 days. Each mailbox sends 25+ warm-up emails a day to Google recipients, 25 to Outlook and 25 to other providers. Send no cold email in this period.

  6. Ramp to full volume by day 21. Start low cold volume from day 14, raise it over the following week, and reach up to 25 cold emails per mailbox a day around day 21. Keep warm-up running while you send.

  7. Connect the sending tool. Send from the included sending engine, or connect Instantly or Smartlead with an API key so the mailboxes are added to that account. Other tools take a CSV export or the SMTP/IMAP logins. Load the client's copy and a follow-up sequence; keep links out of the copy.

  8. Set the reporting cadence. Agree which numbers the client sees and how often, before the first send (next section).

Day

Client status

1

Workspace, domains and mailboxes ordered; mailboxes ready within 24 hours, warm-up on (client-owned domains: allow 24 to 48 hours for nameservers first)

1 to 14

Warm-up only

14 to 21

Low cold volume, rising

From about 21

Full volume

Reporting to Clients

Report per client, split by recipient provider, because mail from the same mailbox can land in the inbox at Outlook and in spam at Gmail. Outreach2day shows these per mailbox, and each workspace holds one client's numbers:

  • Warm-up inbox, spam and bounce rate.

  • Sends by recipient provider: Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, other.

  • Replies sorted by type, from one inbox for all the client's mailboxes.

  • Google and Outlook placement tests.

Show reply counts next to sends, and flag any mailbox or domain whose warm-up inbox rate falls. A placement test is a sample of seed inboxes, so report it as a trend, not a single score. Inbox placement is measured, not guaranteed, so don't promise it to the client either.

Billing Across Clients

  • Workspaces and team members are free. There is no platform fee and no per-seat charge; you pay for mailboxes and domains.

  • Each workspace has its own first order. Mailboxes are ordered in the app per workspace, and the card saved on a workspace pays for its later domain purchases.

  • Changes are prorated one way. Mailboxes you add are charged right away, prorated; mailboxes you remove give no credit for the current month.

  • Large orders. $2.50 is the list price. Volume discounts are available for large orders: book a call or contact sales. See pricing.

Billing is monthly by card, month to month, with no contract. That matches client retainers that can end at a month's notice.

Automate Onboarding With the REST API

Every account has a REST API (docs at dev.outreach2day.com; 10 requests a second, 300 a minute). For an agency the useful calls are the ones you repeat per client:

Onboarding step

Endpoint

Create the client's workspace

POST /workspaces

Check names are free

POST /check_domains

Buy domains with the client as registrant

POST /domains/purchase with contact_info

Connect client-owned domains

POST /domains/transfer/checkout, then GET /domains/transfer/status

Point domains to the client's site

PATCH /domains/redirects

List the mailboxes

GET /mailboxes

Start warm-up, check its state

POST /warmup/operations, GET /warmup/mailboxes

Add mailboxes to Instantly or Smartlead

POST /sequencers, POST /sequencers/{connection_id}/export

Three limits matter. A workspace created over the API has no card yet, so domain purchases in it return 402 until its first order is made in the app. Mailboxes are ordered in the app, not over the API. And a purchase call is the purchase: there is no confirm step and no idempotency key, so never retry a purchase that timed out before checking GET /domains. Request bodies and error codes are in the cold email API overview and how to buy domains via API.

White Label and Client Access

White-label cold email usually means a client portal under the agency's brand. Some sequencers offer it: Instantly's agency white-labeling page says it "offers a white-label solution for agencies on Hyper Growth and Light Speed plans," lets you share "Campaigns(View or Edit), Unibox, Analytics, CRM, and Blocklist" with clients, and puts the client login on your own subdomain with your logo. The same page says "you can only configure one agency portal per workspace."

Outreach2day does not offer a white-label portal. If you want clients to log in under your brand, run the campaigns in a sequencer that offers one and use Outreach2day for the mailboxes, connected with an API key.

Agency Cold Email Tools by Layer

We make Outreach2day, so it is listed first; the other entries use each vendor's own public pages.

Layer

What the agency needs per client

Options

Mailboxes, domains, warm-up

Separate domains and mailboxes, one workspace per client

1. Outreach2day; 2. Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 accounts from a reseller

Sending and replies

Campaigns, follow-ups, one reply inbox

1. Outreach2day's included sending engine; 2. Instantly; 3. Smartlead

Client portal

Branded login for clients

Instantly's agency white-labeling (Hyper Growth and Light Speed plans)

Offboarding a Client

When a client leaves, settle the domains first, then cancel.

  1. Export what you need. Reply threads live in the client's workspace; save what the contract says the client gets.

  2. Hand over the domains. Domains registered in the client's name are theirs. Support moves them to the client's own Namecheap account on request. DNS records and the redirect do not follow the domain: the client sets them up again at the new home.

  3. Cancel the client's mailboxes. Cancel through the in-app chat or support@outreach2day.com. Cancelling deletes the mailboxes and they cannot be restored, so the client cannot keep sending from those addresses through us. There are no charges after the current paid month.

  4. Tell the client about warm-up. If they send from the same domains with a new provider, the new mailboxes need warm-up again.

FAQ

Can I use the same mailboxes for two clients?

No. Mailboxes on one domain share its reputation, so one client's complaints would lower the other client's placement. Give each client its own domains and mailboxes.

How long does it take to onboard a new cold email client?

About three weeks to full volume: mailboxes are ready within 24 hours, warm-up runs alone for 14 days, low cold volume starts on day 14 and full volume comes around day 21.

How much does cold email infrastructure cost per client?

At Outreach2day, a client sending 500 cold emails a day needs 20 mailboxes ($50 a month) on 4 domains ($52 a year as .com), plus a card processing fee on the domains. The sending engine and warm-up are included.

Should the agency or the client pay for domains?

Either works if the registrant is agreed in writing. Registering domains in the client's name makes the handover simple when the contract ends.

Do I need Google Workspace accounts for client campaigns?

No. Outreach2day mailboxes are standard SMTP/IMAP mailboxes, not Google Workspace or Microsoft 365, and they work with any sending tool that accepts SMTP/IMAP.

Sources

Checked September 2026:

  • Google: Email sender guidelines: Gmail tracks volume, feedback and limits per domain and IP address; DKIM and SPF quotas are per domain; shared IP activity affects all senders on that IP.

  • Instantly: Agency white-labeling: white-label solution on Hyper Growth and Light Speed plans; shared sections (Campaigns, Unibox, Analytics, CRM, Blocklist); client login on your subdomain with your logo; one agency portal per workspace.

Create one workspace per client and size the first one with the numbers above.

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