Here are the steps that I take to get an SPF Record going on DreamHost
SPF records
Sender Policy Framework (SPF) records allow domain owners to specify which hosts are permitted to send email on behalf of their domains. Normal SMTP allows any computer to send an email claiming to be from anyone. Thus, it’s easy for spammers to send emails with forged From: addresses. SPF allows a domain owner to use a special format of DNS TXT records to specify which machines or hosts are authorized to transmit email for their domain; this makes it difficult to forge From: addresses.
For example, if you own the domain askapache.com, you can designate which hosts are authorized to send email originating from user@askapache.com. Your recipient’s servers will then identify the origin of your message by checking the SPF record.
SPF For Gmail
Sender Policy Framework (SPF) records allow domain owners to specify which hosts are permitted to send email on behalf of their domains, making it hard to forge From: addresses. We strongly encourage you to publish SPF records for your domain — having these records in place will ultimately help fight spam.
How do I set my SPF records?
To set your domain’s SPF record, publish the following TXT record on the DNS resource: v=spf1 include:aspmx.googlemail.com ~all.
Get the IP address for your mail server
Use this to find the Servers that send your mail
What about subdomains?
If I get mail from pielovers.demon.co.uk, and there’s no SPF data for pielovers, should I go back one level and test SPF for demon.co.uk?
No. Each subdomain at Demon is a different customer, and each customer might have their own policy. It wouldn’t make sense for Demon’s policy to apply to all its customers by default; if Demon wants to do that, it can set up SPF records for each subdomain.
So the advice …
