Not getting replies to your campaigns? It's your MX records

If you've launched a campaign in Navigent but the replies you expected never show up in your inbox, there is one explanation that is far more likely than all the others combined:

Your MX records are pointing to the wrong place.

Every email you sent went out just fine, and recipients replied just fine — but their replies were delivered to a mailbox you aren't watching. In plain terms: you built the shop, but the mailbox is sitting at the old address.

This guide explains exactly what MX records are, how to check whether yours are correct, and precisely what to do if they aren't.

If you get stuck at any step, email info@navigent.io and I'll personally help you get it sorted.

What is an MX record — and why does it control everything?

An MX record is a DNS setting on your domain that tells the internet where to deliver your incoming email.

Think of it as an address forwarder: when someone sends an email to you@yourcompany.com, their server first looks up DNS and asks "hey, where should mail for yourcompany.com go?". The answer to that question is the MX record.

If you've moved your email from (for example) Outlook to Google Workspace — or the other way around — but forgot to update your MX records, here's what happens:

1. You send your campaign from your new Google account.
2. The recipient clicks Reply and writes a long, interested response.
3. Their server looks up the MX record for your domain.
4. MX still points at your old Outlook server.
5. The reply lands in an inbox you no longer watch.
6. You think nobody replied. Lead lost.

This is by far the most common cause of "my campaigns aren't working" — and it's 100% fixable.

Step 1: Check your current MX records in 30 seconds

You don't need to be a developer to check this. Open this free tool:

https://mxtoolbox.com/mxlookup

Type in your domain (e.g. yourcompany.com) and click MX Lookup.

You'll see a list of MX records. Look at the "Hostname" column:

If your MX records don't match the provider you actually check mail with, that's the problem. Continue to Step 2.

Step 2: Fix your MX records

MX records are changed at the company where you registered your domain — not at Google or Microsoft. Common domain registrars include One.com, Simply.com (formerly UnoEuro), GratisDNS, GoDaddy, Namecheap, and Cloudflare.

Log into your registrar's control panel and find the page called "DNS", "DNS records", or "Advanced settings".

If you're on Google Workspace

Delete all existing MX records, then create this single one (simpler and fully supported):

Or, for redundancy, the full classic set:

If you're on Microsoft 365

Delete all existing MX records, then create this one:

The exact hostname is shown inside your Microsoft 365 Admin Center under Settings → Domains.

Full A-Z walkthrough: moving mail from Outlook back to Google Workspace

If you need to move your email from Outlook / Microsoft 365 back to Google Workspace (the most common situation I see), here's the exact order to follow. Do it step-by-step — don't skip any.

Phase 1: Prep Google (add the old address as an alias)

First we tell Google that your inbox also owns your old email address.

1. Go to admin.google.com and sign in with your new Google email (hi@yourdomain.com). This is your admin console.
2. In the left menu, click Users.
3. Click your own name in the list to open your profile.
4. Scroll down and click the box labeled User information.
5. Click Alternate email addresses.
6. Click the Alternate email field.
7. Type whatever came before the @ in your old address (e.g. info, contact, whatever you used).
8. Click the blue Save button at the bottom.

Google is now ready to catch mail sent to your old address.

Phase 2: Let Gmail send from the old address too

1. Go to gmail.com and sign in as hi@yourdomain.com.
2. Top-right, click the gear icon (Settings).
3. Click See all settings.
4. Open the Accounts tab.
5. Find the section Send mail as.
6. If your old address isn't already there, click Add another email address.
7. A small window pops up. Enter your name and your old email address. Leave the "Treat as an alias" checkbox ticked. Click Next Step.

Phase 3: Switch the MX records at your registrar

This is the critical step — here we redirect mail traffic to Google. The instructions below are for One.com, but the principle is identical at every registrar.

1. Sign in to your One.com control panel.
2. Find the Advanced settings box (often near the bottom of the page) and click DNS settings.
3. Open the DNS records tab.
4. Scroll down to the current list of records. Find every record of type MX (the ones currently pointing to Outlook) and click the trash icon next to each one to delete them all.
5. At the top, choose type MX.
6. Fill in the fields exactly like this:
   • Host: Leave empty. If the system insists on a character, use @.
   • Value: smtp.google.com
   • Priority: 1
7. Click Create record (or Save).

Be patient. DNS changes typically take between 15 minutes and 24 hours to propagate globally. During that window some mail may still land in your old Outlook — totally normal. Check again tomorrow.

Phase 4: Pull your old mail into Google (import)

Last step — import your old mail history (and anything that arrives in Outlook during the propagation window) into your new Gmail.

1. Back in Gmail → gear icon → See all settings.
2. Open the Accounts tab.
3. Find the section Check mail from other accounts — it's further down the page.
4. Click Add a mail account.
5. Enter your old email address and click Next.
6. Choose Link accounts with Gmailify if offered, OR choose Import emails from my other account (POP3) and click Next.
7. Sign in with the password for your old Outlook mailbox to confirm you own it.
8. Approve the permissions on screen and click Start.

Google will now pull all your old mail across in the background. Close the window and keep using Gmail normally while it runs. When it's finished, everything lives in one place and you can close Outlook for good.

Step 3: Verify it's working

After 24 hours:

1. Go back to https://mxtoolbox.com/mxlookup and look up your domain again. The MX records should now point to the correct provider (e.g. aspmx.l.google.com).
2. Ask a friend to send a test email to your address. It should land in your Gmail (or Outlook, if that's where you want mail).
3. Launch a tiny test campaign inside Navigent with just 1 lead — a friend or one of your own other addresses. Ask them to reply. The reply should arrive in your inbox.

If the test passes, you're ready to run real campaigns again.

Still stuck?

If you've followed the guide and something still isn't right (mail going to spam, MX not propagating, a registrar with a weird DNS panel you can't figure out), don't waste hours wrestling with it alone.

Email info@navigent.io.

Send me your domain and a short description of where you're stuck, and I'll look at your setup personally and fix it with you.