You can send great looking, full HTML email anytime in a snap. Whether your list size is 50 or 5,000 our system handles all of the mailing for you (hooray for not clogging up your email program!) and can send it with any email address you specify (with appropriate DNS settings). You can manage your lists, mailings, unsubscribers, and more.
Mailing Lists
To start, you will need to add Lists to your site so that you can begin growing your subscriber base. Lists are independent of enewsletters (messages), as visitors sign up for a list, and you choose which list(s) to send your created message to. In other words, visitors sign up for a list rather than an individual publication you may have. Some clients only have 1 message, so they title their List to be the same thing, and when they design their message, they associate the same List to it. Other clients, have several messages. Their lists may be something like Youth, Parents, and Elderly. Then they may have 2 or 3 messages that go to each of these lists.
Adding Lists and Recipients
To add a new list, access the 'Mailing Lists' tab and click the 'Add New' Button.
Set the name, privacy option, description, and save. If the list should be private, select the box that says, "Is it Private?" This allows you to create a List that will not be displayed in your membership registration and member profile / settings screens. So, if you were creating a list that you didn't want just anyone subscribing to, like "Staff", then you would want to mark the list as private.
Once added, you can begin manually adding subscribers (recipients) to the list. You will be given several options to add recipients to your list. This includes adding single email addresses, uploading a list of email addresses you may have, adding individual members already in your membership database, and or relating member groups that you have created in the Member's tab.
Editing Mailing Lists
If you need to update a list's details, add, edit or remove subscribers you can do so by clicking the edit link to the left of the list name.
Unsubscribers
Our system will include a standard footer at the bottom of every message that is sent that notifies the recipient who the sending email address was, who it was sent to, and options to unsubscribe. Recipients can choose to unsubscribe from the list that they were associated with or from the site completely. As a note, when a user unsubscribes from a list, although not ideal, you can manually add them to other lists in your site. Unsubscribe preferences honor the list only and not the site. Therefore, to ensure folks are fully unsubscribed from a site, route them to the link in their email recieved to unsubscribe and let them know to unsubscribe from all future mailings. Doing so will remove them completely from the mailings. You can view your list's unsubscribers by clicking on the Unsubscribers link by the list name.
Deleting Lists
Click the trash can icon inline with the list name to delete the list competely. This does not delete any emails or profiles associated to the list, just the overall list within your site.
Growing your recipient list on the Frontend
Public Site Registrations
You can turn site registration on within the People area of the system. This will display a link in your sub menu allowing website visitors to register and create a profile on your site (if our design team hasn't hidden this link. If it is hidden, submit a ticket and we'll get it to display!) During this registration process, the visitor will be displayed a list of the public 'Lists' you have created. When they choose to be part of a list, they will become a recipient of that list. When you choose to send to that list, they will be included.
Template (Site Design) Text Field
Our design team can add a text field within your site design that will allow someone to enter their email address to receive your mailings. Once the visitor enters this information, they will be taken to a screen that will display all the public 'Lists' that you have created. When they choose to be part of a list, they will become a recipient of that list. When you choose to send to that list, they will be included.
Messages
This is the process for adding an actual message in the system with content and sending it.
Click the 'Messages' tab of the Mass Mail area and then click the 'New' button to compose a new mail.
If you will send something very similar to a previously sent mail (same settings, lists, and similar content) find the previously sent mail and click its 'Duplicate' button. This will move all the content and settings forward, yes you can change it all, but saves you time from having to recreate it from scratch.
Enter the appropriate data for the enews. This includes the subject, actual content, sender information, and list selections.
Template: Choose System Standard unless otherwise directed by your account manager.
From Name: is the Name that you would like to appear for the email in recipient's mailboxes.
From Email: This is the email address that your message will be sent from during the send process. To change this, simply log in the admin area with the email address (user account) that you would like this to come from. Once you are logged in with that account, you can SCHEDULE your message to send out at a specific time, and it will use the email address of the user that is logged in at that time.
Reply Address: This is the email address that will be marked as the reply to address for your message.
Lists: Select the Lists that you would like your message to be sent to. This area will display the current lists that your account has. Each list will have a number to the right of it, which represents the current total number of recipients that is contained in that list. As you select one or more lists, you will see the message that states how many recipients your message will be sent to.NOTE: Although you can pick any lists to send to, each message will have an unsubscribe link to honor the recipients unsubscribe preferences, and to follow CAN-SPAMM compliant laws.
SO, if a user does unsubscribe, they are not unsubscribing from you or from your message, they are unsubscribing from the List they are a recipient to. Do exercise discretion when you are sending to Lists and make sure to send to Lists appropriately so that you do not lose subscribers due to irrelevant content.
Click Save to save the data and settings for the mail.
Saving, Scheduling, and Sending Mail
At the bottom of your mail, once saved, you will see several buttons allowing you to save, send a test, schedule the mail to be sent, and view it online.
Sending a Test
Easily send yourself a test of the mail to see what it will appear like before you blast it to everyone. This is the opportunity to check for mistakes and other issues that you may have overlooked. Some clients use this so that they can send their boss the actual mailing for approval. When sending a test, enter the email address of the recipient(s) you'd like for the test email to send to. Separate multiple email addresses by only a comma.
Scheduling Mail Sends
Once you're ready for the enews to be sent, you can click the Schedule button which will allow you to select the date and time that you would like for your enews to be sent. NOTE: To ensure delivery, be sure you have selected your mailing list(s) and saved before proceeding to schedule your mass mail blast. Our system will start compiling and sending your blast at the scheduled time, however, it can take up to one hour for the blast to appear as sent and begin to be delivered. Currently we compile and begin to deliver scheduled mail once per hour.
Canceling Scheduled Mail
Once you've scheduled a mailing, if you need to cancel the mail before it sends, simply click on the mail name as if you we're going to edit it and a pop up will display asking you to cancel the pending delivery. The mail will be cancelled and you can either edit or delete the mailing after that point.
View Online
If you would like to view your mailing online in a blank window this button will do the trick. Your mailing will also include the view online option in case a recipient is having trouble viewing your sent mail.
Deleting (Archiving) Mail
Check the box to the left of the message name and click the 'Archive' button. This will remove the message from your current view and put it 'behind the scenes'.If you ever need this message back, change the view drop down to Archived, and the system will display all of your archived messages. Select the box to the left of the message name that you would like to become active again, and click the 'Activate' button. This will only bring the message back to the active view, and does not resend the Mass Mail, unless it has a future scheduled send date and time.
Reporting
Need to see how many recipients opened your message or how many unique views you had? No Problem. If your message has been sent, you can retrieve instant up to the minute reporting for that message's send. Access the Mass Mail tab. Locate the Sent Message that you would like to view the reporting on and under the 'Status' Column, click on the 'View Report' link. This will display the current reporting data for your message which includes: total # of recipients, # of unique views, total # of opens, successful open rate, and a listing of the recipients that opened the message and which list they are a recipient of.
SPAM Control and SPF Records
To prevent your mail from appearing as SPAM when sent from our servers on behalf of your email address or domain, it is important to create a valid SPF record that allows our server's IP addresses to send mail on your behalf. Read more about this in our SPF article here.
You must have an actual email address (physical mailbox that you can log into and check mail and not a list, group, or forwarding email) for your mass mail's sending email address. For example, if we sent a mass mail from support@mydomain.com, an actual mailbox for support@mydomain.com must be setup and actively checked. The mailbox must be real and active, otherwise, the email could be blocked or sent to SPAM. During the send process, email providers run quick behind the scenes lookups to see if the sending email address is real and active, otherwise, it will appear as SPAM and potentially get sent to SPAM or blocked entirely.
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