There are a number of things you need to consider when sending bulk emails from OpenCRM and as an ongoing concern if this is something you do regularly.
Why is this important?
Deliverability of your emails
The most obvious one - if you do not follow the recommendations when sending bulk email from OpenCRM, there is a good chance the emails you send will not arrive or will be trapped by spam checkers.
Domain Reputation
Repeatedly sending emails:
- from badly configured domains
- to badly managed lists
- with content which looks like spam
can damage the reputation of your domain for sending emails. This will affect all emails you send and their deliverability - not just the bulk emails, but also single emails sent through OpenCRM.
Potential suspension of bulk mail service / Breach of acceptable use
A high number of bounce, delay or abuse reports from your emails can result in an automatic suspension of your bulk email account, meaning you will not be able to send any bulk emails from OpenCRM until this suspension is lifted. This usually requires you to analyse and correct all configuration issues and check your mailing lists are clean and well managed. (See later). This can put a significant pause in your email marketing efforts, so it is better to be actively managing this to prevent this happening.
Domain Configuration
Ensure that your domain is correctly set up to send emails through OpenCRM:
List Management
Ensure the list of email addresses you are sending to is well managed. It should contain people who have opted in to your lists (or have had the option to opt out), and regularly maintained to remove any failing/ bouncing addresses.
Poor list management is likely to lead to a higher level of complaints, and this can affect deliverability of all emails, and potentially lead to suspension of your bulk email account.
We recommend using Campaigns in OpenCRM to manage your bulk emails.
Double Opt-In
For the best practise in list management, we recommend a double opt-in approach. Double opt-in is a two-step email marketing process where a user must first sign up on a form and then click a confirmation link in an automatic email to be added to a mailing list. This process ensures a higher quality, more engaged subscriber list and helps with legal compliance by verifying the email address belongs to the person who agreed to subscribe
Subscription/ List Management
You can use subscription management in OpenCRM to ensure your lists are targeted to specific groups of Contacts, and your recipients can choose which lists/ subscriptions they receive emails for.
Bounce Management
It is important that you regularly clean your mailing lists to remove email addresses that are bouncing. When an email bounces, you will receive an undeliverable email. If this undeliverable email suggests a permanent failure in the email address (the address or domain no longer exist for example), then you should remove this email address from your OpenCRM system, and the recipient from your campaigns or mailing lists.
High levels of bounces will result in an automatic suspension of your bulk mail service.
If you use Pop2OpenCRM, then OpenCRM can help you to automatically manage your bounce backs.
Email Content
The content of your email is important. It should be relevant, and targeted to the people you are sending it to. It should not contain broken images or links. Additionally, see the following
Remove Me
The email should contain a clear link/remove me option. OpenCRM's click through wizard and portal can be used to help you manage this.
Unsubscribe Header
Increasingly, large email providers are looking for/require an unsubscribe header to be present in your email. This is similar to a remove me link - it instructs the mail client where the recient will go to unsubscribe from your mailing lists. The email client can then provide the user with a link/ button which appears outside of the email and in the email client itself. Yahoo/ AOL currently require this on all bulk emails.
Test your Content/ Template
Use an email testing service to test the content of your template and domain configuration for any errors before sending out a bulk email. Most of these services will also test for and report any domain configuration issues which will affect deliverability. Correct any errors before you send your bulk email. Depending on the error, you may encounter poor deliverability, poor engagement, or in the worst case domain reputation issues or bulk mail suspension. We recommend:
See also: