anyone work with large (opt-in, non-spam) mailing lists?

[markav]

Our company has an opt-in mailing list of our customers that we've built up over a number of years. It's not huge, but it is a few thousand email addresses at this point.

Up to now we've been using our local isp's SMTP to send out our newsletter. But we're moving, and it looks like we may have to go through a cable provider that has severe restrictions on how much volume can be sent out.

Looking over hostgator's knowledge base, I don't think going through their smtp is going to be a viable option.

Anybody have any experience in this area? What do you do if you're a small business with a legit need to send out a few thousand emails once or twice a month?

[vtrain]

just asked very recently the same question:

http://forums.hostgator.com/showthread.php?t=4389

and got some answer

Hope it helps,

[markav]

Originally Posted by vtrain

just asked very recently the same question:

http://forums.hostgator.com/showthread.php?t=4389

and got some answer

Hope it helps,

Thanks vtrain, but I can't access that thread for some reason (is it a section for resellers?). I'd be grateful if you could post some hilights in this thread.

[mw5cents]

markav,

My suggestion would be to install PHPList. This can even be installed via fantastico. When setting up make sure you read through the following thread to ensure you comply with HG mail policies:
http://forums.hostgator.com/showthread.php?t=3574

Also I have installed PHPList for a client and would be willing to offer advice or support in any way I can. But as I told vtrain "If a farm boy from Iowa can do it...so can you! "

Hope this helps.

[markav]

Originally Posted by mw5cents

markav,

My suggestion would be to install PHPList.

Thanks for the suggestion. My one reservation about switching from my current solution was that it can handle bouncebacks. But I see phplist can too. I'll have to investigate further.

That brings up another question: So I'd probably set it to send out about 125 emails an hour so that there would be room under the cap for the rest of our company to send out their normal email correspondence. That means that the script would be sending out email for about 48 hours based on the size of our list. Is there a problem having it run for that long, do you think?

Thanks for your suggestion. I had not investigated this option before.

[Dwight]

Originally Posted by markav

Thanks for the suggestion. My one reservation about switching from my current solution was that it can handle bouncebacks. But I see phplist can too. I'll have to investigate further.

That brings up another question: So I'd probably set it to send out about 125 emails an hour so that there would be room under the cap for the rest of our company to send out their normal email correspondence. That means that the script would be sending out email for about 48 hours based on the size of our list. Is there a problem having it run for that long, do you think?

Thanks for your suggestion. I had not investigated this option before.

If you want a paid solution, I'd look at ConstantContact.com... They handle all the bandwidth problems for you, you get excellent tracking of when your newsletters are viewed, and by who, even down to the links that are clicked. I know there are other programs that will do all this without a monthly fee, but for us it has been worth it.

Dwight

[markav]

Originally Posted by Dwight

If you want a paid solution, I'd look at ConstantContact.com... They handle all the bandwidth problems for you, you get excellent tracking of when your newsletters are viewed, and by who, even down to the links that are clicked. I know there are other programs that will do all this without a monthly fee, but for us it has been worth it.

Dwight

Thanks Dwight, I had someone else recommend them to me also, so they must be pretty good. Price looks a little steep for the once a month we'd typically use it, but if we start going more frequently it might be worth looking into.

Thanks everyone for your suggestions.

[mbrando]

Hi,

You might put your PHPlist on a separate hosting account so your email limits do not effect your office email. You might even want to consider some kind of VPS solution that does not have email limitations.

Or in the past I've used a server called http://www.exacttarget.com.

Mike