Ramp

A ramp is two numbers and a start date: what the mailbox may send on its first day, and how much that allowance grows each day, up to the cap. It is deliberately dull arithmetic. The point is that an operator can read it, predict it and explain it, which matters more than any sophistication would.

Growth stops at the cap. The ramp is a floor-raising schedule, not a second ceiling, so a mailbox with a low cap simply reaches it sooner.

The volume during a ramp should be genuine outbound to recipients you chose, not manufactured traffic. Engagement from people who have a reason to reply is the signal providers are looking for, and it is the only kind that survives contact with the filters that matter.

This is also the practical argument against exchange networks that trade messages between strangers' mailboxes to fake engagement: the traffic is not real, the pattern is recognisable, and joining one ties your domain's reputation to everyone else in the pool. A slower ramp against real recipients is both safer and cheaper.

With a small starting allowance and a steady daily increment, a mailbox reaches a typical cold-outbound cap in a few weeks. That is the honest number, and it is why identity count should be planned before a campaign rather than during one — you cannot ramp your way out of a deadline.

A mailbox that has been established for a long time does not need a ramp at all; its cap applies from the first send. Ramping is specifically about the absence of history.

SalesShift computes today's ceiling as min(daily cap, ramp initial + ramp increment × days since the ramp started), defaulting to 10 on day one and +5 a day. A mailbox with no ramp start date is treated as established and gets its full cap immediately. The ramp is real outbound to your own recipients — there is no exchange network.