New recommendations for Newsletters
Some of you are using Mailpoet on your websites to generate newsletters. I have run into a lot of problems sending out my newsletter this month, I have had to send it three times. I checked through my logs and found that a very small number came out last month as well. I have been investigating what has happened. The top two entries in the image below show there is a problem because rather than a 65%+ opening rate, there is a 4% opening rate.
As is often the case with these things the reason is not always apparent, in the first instance I used some code in one of my news items relating to “http:// ” and this triggered a block in the hosting so the newsletter was stopped. I don’t know at what point it was stopped, but it looks to be after around 10 to 15 messages.
I removed the offending code, and resent yesterday, the same thing happened. This time I have been told not to use the PHP mail function in WordPress, it is now rate limited. What that means is for the odd message from the website, using the wordpress default method to send a message is fine. If you want to send a lot of messages, let’s say more than 10 at any one time from the website, then you need to use a different method. This recommendation has come about because a). I can see there is now a problem where there was not one before, and b). The hosting company have changed something.
Why is there a problem again?
Over the years we have been doing this we run into problems from time to time with issues relating to sending bulk mail. A newsletter is a form of bulk mail. It is in the interest so the hosting company to detect and stop bulk mail because that is what hackers do when they get into someone’s hosting or server. The increasing problem is the hosting companies (this one, and others that I have used) are constantly adding things and changing things to detect bulk mailing, they also do not not have a way of determining whether the bulk mailing is legitimate, so from time to time the things you have done that simply worked ok, stop working. This is the reason why, and this is the problem I have faced over the past day or so.
Solution #1 (preferred)
Right now I am recommending just for Newsletters (MailPoet) you use an external sending service that is designed to reliably send newsletter messages. I have not done this in the past because it often costs money to do it, and the majority of you are charities, trying to keep your costs down.
MailPoet made some changes when MailPoet 3 came out, one of them was to add a sending service. Provided your database is less than 2000. You can set up a free account and send mail through their service which is integrated with the MailPoet plugin. The net result should be that the newsletter is more reliably sent, and you are no longer dependent on the sending services in your website hosting. This is what most commercial companies would do.
What you need to do
Only do this if you are using MailPoet in your installation, if you are not using MailPoet, you do not have this problem.
Mailpoet offers a free sending service where you use their email send server to send your newsletter. The main advantage of using this method is that the sending mail server will obey several types of test to establish whether the sending authority is legitimate or not. It is during some of these test occasionally the simpler systems will fail for some reason. Shared hosting can sometimes have problems due to other websites sending out mail, which affects the rating of the server, and subsequently your website on that server. Using an external service will avoid this situation.
Login to your website, look for MailPoet, go to Settings and click on the button New! Try it for free for up to 2000 subscribers. This will take you to an article on Our Free Sending Plan. Click on the sign up button.
Choose the free option of 2000 users (Free without premium users). Create an account, they will want to know an email address (which you need access to, to confirm the account), address of your organisation and other information. When complete you need to submit the form and then check your email box.
Locate the email, click on the link and this completes the process. Next return to the MailPoet website and enter your email address (the one you registered) and your password to enter your account.
Go to your account from the menu, and locate your free key. Copy it, then return to your website where you had the MailPoet settings page open. Enter the settings for the MailPoet Sending Service page and paste in your key.
Exit and then activate. Your site will now use MailPoet’s sending service for your newsletters. Provide you stay below 2000 subscribers the service will remain free.
Solution 2
On some sites I have also set up MailPoet to use an email account in the hosting. You can do this too. The former method is probably going to be more robust.
If you want to tie your newsletter to a outbound mail service (SMTP) then you need to first create an email account. Note the email address you have created and the password you were given.
- Login to your website, go to MailPoet, and choose Settings, and then choose Other. On the next page in the form choose SMTP as the method.
- Sending frequency set for 30 emails every 15 minutes
- Set up SMTP hostname as smtp.stackmail.com
- SMTP port 587
- Login: the full email address of your new account
- Password: The password you were given when the account was set up.
- Secure connection select TLS
- Authentication select Yes
- Finally put your email address in and test it. You should receive a message if it is correct.
- Then Activate.
With this set up an email account in your hosting (or an external one) is used to send out your newsletters. I recommend you use one associated with your domain name, and not an external one. This will improve the chances of messages getting through to the recipients.
You should remember to check the mail box for any returned messages in case there are problems.