Which Newsletter Software?

by dave_hermansen

Posted: 12 years ago 12 replies

INTERNET MARKETING

We have a ~70k person mailing list that we plan to start mailing out to here in the next couple of months. This is a totally legit list of past clients that manually opted in.

Although I have a ton of experience ecommerce & many things IM-related, I really don't have too much experience with managing a mailing list. So I was hoping to get some suggestions on what the best 3rd party solution is for running a large mailing list like this. Any feedback is much appreciated!!

While we're on the subject, I'd love to be pointed in the direction of some good educational info on managing a mailing list as well. I've done it before & know the basics, but could definitely become better educated about it..

#newsletter #software

FraserC 12 years ago

Aweber or Mailchimp are the main ones everyone uses - both are expensive, but if you can't make $500+ a month from a 70K mailing list... Mailchimp's features and user interface are so sweet.

You might also want to take a look at Feedblitz. They give you options to put ads in emails to send them for free.
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TopKat22 12 years ago

I use aweber, however, if you upload a new list to them, you will have to prove they opted in or they will all have to opt in again.

Aweber provides lots of templates you can choose from to format your newsletter and makes it easy to create them and then schedule them out when to send in advance.

Most of the services like aweber offer this and they give you all the basic training you need included in the monthly fee to get started and manage your list.
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- fluffythewondercat 12 years ago
  
  Hi Dave,
  
  Always great to see the ecommerce dude here.
  
  Anyway, I use ConstantContact without any issues, but my list is only about 4k. They allow me to enter smallish numbers of new addresses without opt-in -- don't know what they'd do about 70k. I'd ask first.
  
  The problem you're going to run into with your list -- and I'm sure you've thought of this -- is spam reports and bounces. Even when everyone has opted in, several months later some of them are not going to remember unless you've been mailing them regularly. There's a rumor that you're not allowed to exceed 1% spam reports, though I haven't seen that in action.
  
  Would it make sense to create a number of smaller lists and mail them separately, at least at first?
  
  fLufF
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bigslamgyrl 12 years ago

Personally, I am an Aweber girl all the way
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dave_hermansen 12 years ago

Thanks for the feedback guys!!

So I assume it's a bad idea to use something that's open source like PHP List?

Obviously, I would set it up to only send out a few hundred an hour or something like that..
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Ash R 12 years ago

Maintaining your own mail server is a massive headache, it's much better to sign up with one of the AR companies and let them handle it.

Imnica mail might allow you to import the list without them re-opting in, but ask them first. The owner is a member here. Most AR's will require that your list re-verify and you'll probably lose a lot of subs through this process.

One tip: it sounds like they've been on your list for a while but you never mailed them. They may have forgotten who you are. So re-introduce yourself and remind them how/why they signed up.
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- dave_hermansen 12 years ago
  
  Thanks for the advice..
  
  Yes, all of the people on the list opted in anywhere from 6 months to 3 years ago.. I know it sounds crazy to be sitting on a 70k person mailing list, but we've been "frying bigger fish!" - I guess the purpose of starting to mail out now is to invite everyone to come eat the fish we're done frying!?
  
  Thanks again & if anyone else has any suggestions they would be much appreciated as well!!
  
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dave_hermansen 12 years ago

Anyone else have feedback on what the best mailing list software is??

Particularly, does anyone know of one that wouldn't require a 're-opt in' when I import my 70k person list??
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- fluffythewondercat 12 years ago
  
  I understand there are some services that don't require opt-in.
  
  However, mail originating from them tends to be blocked at the ISP level. Since they allow spammers, they're not good citizens. My husband, who works at the largest west coast Internet exchange, thinks even MailChimp (which does require opt-in) tolerates spammers. Admins have a low tolerance for this stuff. Unfortunately that puts you in the position of a dolphin caught in a tuna net.
  
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FraserC 12 years ago

Yeah, you want to make the first email to your list absolutely fantastic - totally valuable for your readers. And don't be surprised when you get a ton of unsubscribe and complaints. But once you've been regularly communicating that will all settle down.
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dave_hermansen 12 years ago

I'm starting to think it might just be best to use something like phplist on my own website and setting it up to only send out a few hundred emails an hour.. That way I wouldn't need to make everyone opt in again, and I also wouldn't be blocked by certain ISPs beforehand.. Would that be a bad idea?
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SearchingLost 12 years ago

We've used Constant Contact numerous times. Works well and gives us some great analytics.
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