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When Is Self-Hosted Email The Right Solution?

by Sinistar
11 replies
After years in IM, I want to get into mailing but I'm having trouble figuring out if I should go with a solution like Get Response or to self-host it myself.

On the surface it seems that self-hosting would be the way to go as you would control the list. You could even sign up for an SMTP service like Mandrill and pay nothing for them to deliver your emails for you until you built up your list big enough where they start charging.

Looking at the email solutions, ArpReach is only $200 which would pay itself off in 6 months comparted to having Aweber or another simiar service do everything for you and having to pay them every month until you retire. Not to mention that they could always take your list and ban you if they don't like what you're doing.

So what's the catch in going the self-hosted route using an SMTP service like Mandrill or SendGrid?
What determines whether you go the self-hosted route vs Aweber/Get Response?
#email #selfhosted #solution
  • Profile picture of the author Kingfish85
    Originally Posted by Sinistar View Post

    After years in IM, I want to get into mailing but I'm having trouble figuring out if I should go with a solution like Get Response or to self-host it myself.

    On the surface it seems that self-hosting would be the way to go as you would control the list. You could even sign up for an SMTP service like Mandrill and pay nothing for them to deliver your emails for you until you built up your list big enough where they start charging.

    Looking at the email solutions, ArpReach is only $200 which would pay itself off in 6 months comparted to having Aweber or another simiar service do everything for you and having to pay them every month until you retire. Not to mention that they could always take your list and ban you if they don't like what you're doing.

    So what's the catch in going the self-hosted route? Is there a lot of maintenance that requires a tech savvy user to take care of? What determines whether you go one route or the other?
    If you get an IP blacklisted, you can forget about your mail being delivered. This is why mail delivery specialty services exist. It doesn't take much for an IP to get landed on an RBL. Wordpress is notorious for getting exploited and blasting off tons of email. You'd probably be better off using something such as SendGrid or SpamExperts - SendGrid specializes in strictly SMTP relaying & SpamExperts does the same but actually filters outgoing mail. SpamExperts is more expensive.
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  • Profile picture of the author Alex Blades
    When Is Self-Hosted Email The Right Solution?
    When you don't want to pay for an auto-responder and don't care if it gets delivered or not.
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  • Profile picture of the author ChrisDouthit
    I have been hosting my own email list as well as using an autoresponder for a long time. It really depends on how much time you have and how large your list is. Getting a high delivery rate can be done on your own server, you just need to make sure you do everything right. That can be a lot of work, so if your list is small it may be better to just pay an autoresponder service. However, if you have a large list and the costs of the autoresponder are very high, then managing your own list might be a worthwhile idea.
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  • Profile picture of the author joaquin112
    You could also rotate IPs to increase your deliverability rate and decrease your chance of having your whole server banned.

    Self-hosted email is good when you are an expert or you hire someone who is. There isn't much information about running a self-hosted e-mail server out there. It can also save you tens of thousands of dollars per month if you have a big enough list and if you can deliver e-mails correctly.

    For everyone else an autoresponder service is the way to go.
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    • Profile picture of the author Sinistar
      Originally Posted by joaquin112 View Post

      You could also rotate IPs to increase your deliverability rate and decrease your chance of having your whole server banned.

      Self-hosted email is good when you are an expert or you hire someone who is. There isn't much information about running a self-hosted e-mail server out there. It can also save you tens of thousands of dollars per month if you have a big enough list and if you can deliver e-mails correctly.

      For everyone else an autoresponder service is the way to go.
      What is it about running a self-hosted email server that requires an expert?

      Does having an SMTP service deliver your email make things easier?
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      • Profile picture of the author brutecky
        Originally Posted by Sinistar View Post

        What is it about running a self-hosted email server that requires an expert?

        Does having an SMTP service deliver your email make things easier?
        Several things make paying for an auto responder worth it:

        1) If you dont have a dedicated server (if your shared or VPS) your host is likely going to not allow you to mass mail anyway.

        2) Even if you do have a dedicated server your going to have compliance and deliver ability issues.
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        • Profile picture of the author Sinistar
          Originally Posted by brutecky View Post

          Several things make paying for an auto responder worth it:

          1) If you dont have a dedicated server (if your shared or VPS) your host is likely going to not allow you to mass mail anyway.

          2) Even if you do have a dedicated server your going to have compliance and deliver ability issues.
          Right. So if I have an SMTP service like Send Grid or Mandrill send my email for me, will that make using a self-hosted solution like ArpReach (to hold my data) easy enough to use for an email newb like myself?
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  • Profile picture of the author lotsofsnow
    Originally Posted by Sinistar View Post

    When Is Self-Hosted Email The Right Solution?
    never.

    Well, unless you want to offer email hosting professionally. With about 1/2 million dollars cash and about 3 month time for research you can for sure set something up. Part of the cash should be spend to hire somebody who knows how this works and the rest of the money would be needed to fund the hardware and another chunk for marketing your new business.
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  • Profile picture of the author kinyash
    I think its better to have a paid auto responder first untill you build up yoour list and you know what you are doing. Self hosted mailers have a learning curve and you have to know the tricks to ensure all your mail is delivered. So until you know what you are doing go with a paid autoresponder
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  • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
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    Originally Posted by Sinistar View Post

    Not to mention that they could always take your list and ban you if they don't like what you're doing.
    Not altogether accurate reasoning, really, I suspect.

    First, you need to back up your list regularly, wherever you keep it.

    Secondly, if you're going to do things which would make Aweber ban you, you're not going to be any better off on your own, anyway: it will just be your own internet connection, hosting, domain-registration and so on that you're putting in jeopardy, rather than Aweber's overall delivery-rates. That's not exactly a "net gain"!

    The decisive factor in whether or not you get into trouble for sending spammy emails isn't really "other people's terms of service": it's just "whether or not you send people spammy emails".

    Don't imagine that just because someone voluntarily gave you their email address, that necessarily legitimizes whatever you send them, and however often you send it: as many here have learned (sometimes to their great cost), that assumption would be a big mistake.
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  • Profile picture of the author vimmaniac
    Self-hosted email is the right solution when your list is all opt-in, and you are certain that people will want to get your emails and your list will grow steadily over time to such a size that you will pay more for outsourced solutions(more than 50-60/month) than it is to setup a self-hosted solution. It is generally recommened to hire someone who knows email systems well, and can setup all the authentications like SPF, DKIM, Domainkeys,Sender-Id, Feedback loop etc. If you decide to do it by yourself, at least try not to become an open-relay.
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