1.- Getting StartedThe Maxbulk Mailer document window is made of
five tab panels
labeled:Message,Recipients,Settings,PreviewandDelivery.In the
process of creating a new email campaign you will very likely go
through those panels in this same order:
1.- You start a new campaign by setting a subject and composing
amessage.2.- You select a recipient list, create a new one or
importrecipientsfrom a file.3.- You select a mail account or create
a new one by entering all the necessarysettings.4.- Youpreviewyour
message to make sure it will show up properly to your
recipients.5.- You send out your message to your recipients and
make sure everything is going well looking at thedeliverypanel.2.-
Composing your messageLaunch MaxBulk Mailer- On launching MaxBulk
Mailer, you are up in the Message panel, where you can start typing
your message.Type the subject- Use the subject field to place a
brief summary of what your message is about. It is recommended that
you keep the subject to 40 characters or less. MaxBulk Mailer also
supplies a number of predefined prefixes ( 'News', 'Announce',
'Information' and 'Press Release') that you can insert to your
subject to help your recipients identify the type of message you
are sending. You can create new ones and store them for later
use.
Compose your message- You can drop text files or paste text from
any other text editor to the message field. If you want to, you can
also spice up your message by sending it as styled text or using
HTML code, with styles like Bold, Underline, larger font size, or a
different font color. Note that styles and HTML increase the size
of the actual email and perhaps not every one will be able to read
it.
Set the priority(Optional) - Priority doesn't make your mail
reach the recipient faster but only produces some effects on
recipient side: subject will show itself with a different color for
example.
Add attachments(Optional) - Maxbulk Mailer also supports the
inclusion of attachments or enclosures, so you can add pictures, a
Microsoft Word document, an Acrobat PDF or any type of document to
your email out. To add an attachment just drag and drop the
corresponding file to the clip icon, to the attachment list or
directly onto the message. Set the encoding if necessary. Please
read carefully the Attachments chapter to learn more on attachments
and encodings. Inline attachments and pictures are allowed.
Ask for a Return Receipt(Optional) - Some email readers include
an option that forces recipients to send a receipt back to the
sender when opening incoming mails. It works properly with Netscape
mail client for example and likely will be implemented in most mail
readers in a near future. Use this feature carefully when sending
mass mailings to avoid being flooded by thousands of receipts!
Set the message format- Depending on the type of message you are
about to send you should select the format that best suits your
needs from Plain Text, Text/HTML, HTML only, Web Page and Styled
Text.
- Select Plain text for plain text messages.- Select Text/HTML
for a combination of a plain text version and an HTML version of
your message.- Select HTML only for an HTML message with no plain
text alternative.- Select Web Page to send a copy of an online Web
page to your recipients.- Select Styled Text if you want to use
styles like Bold, Italic, Underline, Color, Font, Size, Bullet
lists...
Note that MaxBulk Mailer also supports:
- Plain Text with attached or inline attachments.- HTML and
Text/HTML messages with online or inline pictures.- Styled Text
with online or inline pictures.- Web Page (by URL)
An inline attachment in a Plain Text email can be placed
anywhere in your message when an attached attachment will be placed
depending on the recipient email software. An inline picture (HTML,
Text/HTML and Styled Text) is embedded directly into the message
when an online picture will be fetched from the internet when the
recipient open the message. Read the 'Message formats' and the
'Attachments' chapters for more information.3.- Message
formatsDepending on the type of message you are composing select
the format that best suits your needs fromPlain Text,Text/HTML,HTML
only,Web PageandStyled Text. Each format is explained in details
below.
Note: A comment header can be added to your message, whichever
the format you have selected, by using the '' marker. Everything
above that marker will be ignored.
Plain TextThe Plain Text format is the most used, the most
compatible and the fastest way for creating and sending emails. It
is very simple to use as only row text is allowed without styles.
The only thing you have to take care of is the number of characters
per line when you insert line breaks. You can just write sentences
with no line breaks at all, the final result will actually depend
on the recipient email reader. Modern software like Mac OS X Mail,
Entourage or Windows Outlook use to display the lines the same way
without rewrapping but older software may rewrap your text to 72
characters per line following the 'Philip Bar' formatting. This is
the reason why it is usually recommended to keep lines shorter than
72 characters long to avoid unexpected results on the recipient
side, when the email reader is set to rewrap the message contents
to 72 characters. MaxBulk Mailer doesn't insert line breaks on its
own so you are free to send long lines if you prefer and let the
recipient mail reader to freely display the message. MaxBulk Mailer
inserts a 'format=flowed' parameter to the Content-type header of
your message to force the recipient mail reader to keep the
original text format.
The Philip bar is a visual marker which indicates the limit of
the window's visible area when the window is zoomed to fill a
classic (512-pixel-wide) Macintosh screen. It's named for Philip
Borenstein, former tech-writer at Symantec, who requested some
indication of this width limit, so that he could write "read me"
files that all users would be able to read without scrolling.
Text/HTMLThe Text/HTML format is a combination of an HTML
message and a Plain Text alternative. The HTML message is made of
standard HTML code. The Plain Text part follow the Plain Text
format explained above.
Actually the Text/HTML format is a MIME format that means HTML
with a text alternative, the HTML code will be rendered by the
recipient email reader if supported else the Text alternative will
be displayed. To use that format you have to create a text
alternative of your message, usually a plain text copy of your HTML
message and then paste the HTML code below. At delivery time the
Text/HTML will be made of 3 parts:
1.- An error message created automatically by MaxBulk Mailer to
warn the recipient in case its email reader doesn't understand the
MIME format. It says:
This message is in MIME format. Since your mail reader does not
understandthis format, some or all of this message may not be
legible.
2.- The plain text version of your HTML message that will be
used in case the recipient email reader understand the MIME format
but is not able to render HTML.
3.- The HTML code to be rendered if the recipient email reader
application understand the MIME format and is able to render
HTML.
Note: MIME stands for 'MultipurposeInternetMailExtensions'. It
is a standard that describes how internet messages have to be
formated. (RFC2045)
To create a Text/HTML message just choose the Text/HTML format
from the format pull-down menu, write the Text version and paste
the HTML version code below. Your document should be formatted this
way:
Hello world!
Hello world!
Note: If you select the "Text/HTML" format but you don't provide
a text version it will be created on the fly using the HTML code.
You may get very poor results on complex documents though.
The HTML code can be created with your favorite HTML editor
software. We recommend WYSIWYG tools like Adobe Golive, Macromedia
Dreamweaver or a specialized text editor like BBEdit from
Barebones. HTML documents are always saved as text. and tags are
required and are always included in the HTML code.
HTML only'HTML only' messages are made of HTML code only. They
don't have any 'Plain Text' alternative nor a MIME alert. As a
result we always assume that all recipient's email software will be
able to render the HTML code. To create an 'HTML only' message just
paste your HTML code to the MaxBulk Mailer message field and select
the 'HTML only' format from the format pull-down menu. Note that
your HTML code has to begin with the tag and end with the tag. Your
document should be formatted this way:
Hello world!
Note: It's recommended to use the Text/HTML format, which
includes a text alternative version of your message when sending
HTML as perhaps some of your recipient's software may not support
HTML.
HTML code can be created with your favorite HTML editor
software. We recommend WYSIWYG tools like Adobe Golive or
Macromedia Dreamweaver or a specialized text editor like BBEdit
from Barebones. HTML documents are always saved as text. and tags
are required and are always included in the HTML code.
Web PageYou can send a message containing a copy of a web page
simply by using its URL. Just select the 'Web Page' format from the
format pull-down menu and paste the URL in the message field.
MaxBulk Mailer will get the code located at that address and will
send it to your recipients. It is extremely simple and easy to use.
You can provide a BASE HREF tag to the HTML code on the second line
if necessary. The BASE HREF parameter converts all the relative
URLs into absolute ones. To add an alternative plain text version
as with Text/HTML format, add two line-breaks and the text right
below.
Styled Text(Pro only)The Styled Text format allows you to
enhance your text messages with styles such as bold, italic,
underline, colors, fonts and sizes. Select the 'Styled Text' format
from the format pull-down menu and use the formatting options
accessible from both the formatting toolbar located right above the
message field and the 'Format' top menu. Read the 'Formatting text'
chapter for more information on styles.
When sending a "Styled Text" message, MaxBulk Mailer converts
your text into HTML code and also creates a text alternative
version on the fly automatically so all recipients will be able to
read your message even though they use a text-only email reader.4.-
AttachmentsMaxbulk Mailer allows you to send emails with
attachments. You can add pictures, PDFs or any kind of file to your
message. To add an attachment just drag and drop the file to the
clip icon, to the attachment list or directly onto the
message.Click on the disclosure triangle to expand the attachment
panel. You can then use the 'Add' and 'Delete' buttons to modify
the list and double-click any attachment to open it with its
associated viewer application. Command-Click or Control-Click an
attachment to replace it. The attachment panel also lets you change
the encoding if necessary.
EncodingDefault encoding is Base64. Base64 is fine for the vast
majority of attachments. MacBinary, BinHex, AppleSingle and
AppleDouble are old legacy formats used by Apple in the past. You
can also use UUEncode instead of Base64 but this format is less
popular nowadays.
Inline attachmentsMaxBulk Mailer gives full support for inline
attachments allowing you to display pictures or files right in your
message. In fact, inline attachments are files such as pictures you
drag and drop directly to your message rather than to the
attachment panel. As a result, if you have selected the 'Plain
Text' or the 'Styled Text' format, the inline attachments will be
displayed in the place they have been dropped. In the case of the
HTML format, inline pictures will be embedded inside the HTML code
and will be displayed where they are referenced. Note that the
attachment tags or picture references should always correspond to
the files you have attached to your document.
You have to be very careful about the total size of your
attachments when sending individual messages because you will send
as many times that size during the delivery. That means sending
10Kb to 1,000 recipients will generate 10Mb traffic! With a 2Kb/s
bandwidth it will take 1 hour and 25 minutes.5.- RecipientsThe
Recipients panel is the area where you can create and edit your
recipient lists. You can either enter new addresses manually, or
import them from a file or another application like FileMaker Pro
or Excel.The list is made of columns, labeled by default Firstname,
Surname, Company and Email Address followed by 20 optional columns
(Pro only). On the very first column starting from the left, a
check box lets you activate or deactivate each entry individually.
In addition, that column also displays the recipient number and an
icon indicating its delivery status.
Adding, deactivating and deleting recordsYou can add a new
recipient by clicking on the '+' button. First field will be made
editable allowing you to type the text directly. You can move back
and forth between fields/columns by pressing the tab or the
shift-tab keys. To remove recipients from a list, select them and
click on the '-' button. Note that deleting recipients that have
unsubscribed from your newsletter is almost never a good strategy
for maintaining your lists because you may add them again later
accidentally. MaxBulk Mailer lets you deactivate unsubscribed
recipients by highlighting one or several recipients and selecting
the list contextual menu 'Subscribe' or 'Unsubscribe'. Unsubscribed
recipients are deactivated but remain on your list thus you can't
add them again accidently. You can re-subscribe them at anytime
though. If a recipient is present in several lists you can also add
it to the blacklist. You can add addresses to the Blacklist simply
by highlighting them and selecting the 'Add to Blacklist' menu from
both the list contextual menu (right-clicking on the list) and from
the 'Recipients' main menu. The Blacklist is somehow like a global
un-subscription mechanism.
Editing a recordYou can edit a recipient in a separate window by
double-clicking on a its icon or directly in the list by
double-clicking a cell. With the separate editor window you can
navigate back and forth through all the records using the
'Previous' and 'Next' buttons. Press the Command or Control keys at
the same time to increment or decrement by 10 and Shift + Command
or Control for even bigger steps (list count / 25). In addition,
you can use your mouse wheel to navigate back and forth through the
list and edit several entries at once, as you already do with songs
in iTunes. That allows you to set the common data of a group of
recipients or to clear columns. Just highlight several entries from
your list and select 'Edit' from the list contextual menu. You will
get displayed a new multiple edit window very similar to the one in
iTunes, actually it works mostly the same way. Only checked
fields/columns will be finally updated throughout the selection. A
field get checked as soon as you modify it.
Temporal record deactivationIn order to get control over each
recipient for a particular delivery, MaxBulk Mailer lets you enable
or disable each recipient individually. By default all recipients
are checked/activated. Uncheck the recipients you don't want to
send your message to by highlighting one or several recipients and
clicking on any of the check boxes on the left. This feature is
intended to be used for specific deliveries. To deactivate a
recipient as a result of an un-subcription request, use the
'Unsubscribe' feature instead.
Selecting or changing recipient statusesYou can change each
recipient status by using the tool menu located above the list, the
'Recipients | Mark' menu or the list contextual menu. For example a
recipient can be marked as 'Sent' or as 'Unsent'. You may also
select recipients depending on their status ('Select Sent', 'Select
Unsent', 'Select Failed'...) and remove them from the list or
export them to a file.
List managementAll the list management is done by using the list
manager pull-down menu right above the list field and the 'Save'
button on the right. After adding recipients for the first time you
may save the new list by clicking on that 'Save' button or by
selecting the 'Save current list as...' menu from the list manager
pull-down menu. You can add recipients to any existing list by
selecting it first. Just remember to click on the 'Save' button
when you are done. Each time you want to send a message to a list,
just select it from the list manager pull-down menu. You can have
as many lists as you need and all of them will be available through
this same pull-down menu. You can delete a list by selecting it and
choosing the 'Remove Current List' menu from the list manager
pull-down menu. Note that deleted lists are moved to the
'~/Library/Application Support/Maxprog/MaxBulk Mailer/Trash' folder
thus they can be recovered in case or an accidental deletion.
Merging listsYou have the possibility to temporally merge two or
more lists together by selecting the 'Multiple Lists' menu from the
list manager pull-down menu. This option offers by far the best way
to send a message to several lists at once as it takes care of
possible duplicates for you. It lets you create clean new lists as
the combination of others. All you need is at least two lists.
After selecting the 'Multiple Lists' menu from the list manager
pull-down menu you can start with the merging by checking the lists
you want to merge from the top list. You can see the merging on the
recipient list right below. If you uncheck a list, all recipients
from that list are also removed from the merging. If you highlight
one or several lists their recipients will be highlighted as well.
Once you are done you can simply perform a delivery or save the new
list.
Remote List ManagementYou can let people both subscribe to or
unsubscribe from your mailing lists at any time by using the
Mailing List manager. The Mailing List Manager (MLM for short) is a
double opt-in list subscription PHP script you might install on
your site for maintaining your lists online. Your clients and
contacts can then subscribe to or unsubscribe from any of your
lists at any time through a link on your message or through a web
page on your site. It supports a full set of commands you can use
either directly with your web browser to maintain your lists or by
placing them on your web pages or on your outgoing messages. Unlike
other products and depending on your possibilities and knowledge,
MLM is prepared to work with either a mySQL database or simple raw
text files. MLM has no limitations, you can create as many lists as
you wish with as many subscribers as you need. MLM works with
MaxBulk Mailer through the 'Remote Lists' menu allowing you to use
your remote lists directly as if they were local, without needing
to go through the tedious import/export steps. You just need to
edit the script settings, upload it to your site, open MaxBulk
Mailer preferences and enter the script URL and the administrator
password. You can then access your lists from the 'Remote Lists'
menu on the Lists manager pull-down menu. You can get more
information on MLM
here:http://www.maxprog.com/scripts/list_manager/
Global BlacklistThe Global Blacklist prevents you from sending
messages to given addresses whichever the list you have selected.
You just need to add the addresses once to the blacklist to get
them automatically blacklisted everywhere else. The Blacklist is
accessible from the List manager pull-down menu like a regular
list. You can add new addresses to the blacklist as you do with a
regular list or by using the 'Add to Blacklist' menu from both the
list contextual menu (right-clicking on the list) and from the
'Recipients' main menu. Blacklisted addresses appear in red with a
different icon so you can easily tell them apart. To remove an
address from the Blacklist you just have to go to the Blacklist,
select the address(es), click on the delete button '-' and then on
the 'Save' button. As with unsubscribed addresses, blacklisted
recipients are automatically discarded by MaxBulk Mailer when
sending messages. If you add an address that is currently
Blacklisted, it will automatically appear in red with its specific
icon so you can find out instantly about its status.
Quick Selector(Pro Only)Click on the disclosure triangle on the
left of the Lists selector pull-down menu to expand the Quick
Selector panel. The Quick Selector lets you select, unselect,
activate or deactivate entries matching a given rule. For example
you may activate recipients from a given state or select recipients
from a given domain.
SortingAs with any other application, you can sort any column by
pressing on its header. Besides, you can sort email addresses by
domain pressing the ALT or the Command key while clicking on the
email column header or you can sort recipients by status pressing
the ALT or the Command key while clicking on the Delivery column
header.
MaxBulk Mailer supports several types of imports taking care of
bad emails and duplicates for you. Note that duplicate checking can
be deactivated from the preferences. A report is displayed right
after the import when errors or duplicates have been detected.
Importing from a Text file
You can import recipients from other applications quite easily.
The very first step is to save or export your list in a format
MaxBulk Mailer understand. That includes Tab-delimited or
Comma-delimited text among others. Once your file has been created
you just need to click on the Import button, select the 'From a
Text File' menu and open the file. You will then enter the import
screen. After selecting the field delimiter from the field
delimiters pull-down menu you will be able to preview records and
navigate back and forth through the file by clicking on the left
and right arrow buttons. Note that what you see on screen is what
you will get after importing the recipients thus it is important to
set the encoding properly.
Maxbulk Mailer assists you during the importation process by
giving you the possibility to import the fields you really need in
the order you want. In fact, the fields on your file are likely
organized differently and won't correspond with the field order
required by Maxbulk Mailer by default. You can alter that order by
highlighting any field and by using the up and down arrows on the
right hand side of the screen until it matches the correct field
and repeat the operation as many times as needed. You can again
preview the result in real time and check whether each field will
be transfered into the right places. Once all the fields have been
aligned and are properly checked, click the 'Import' button.
Note that the email field is mandatory and must contain an email
address. If no email address is detected, the entry will be
discarded. MaxBulk Mailer lets you save your current import
settings for later use. Just use the 'Import Presets' pull-down
menu to create, load or remove your presets.
Drag'n'drop
You can add recipients directly by dragging and dropping a file
to the recipient list. You have to make sure the file is a
Tab-delimited plain text file and the fields it contains are
organized in the right order, namely, the First name, the Surname,
the Company, the Email address followed by the optional fields if
any (Pro version only):
FirstName1Surname1Company1Email1Opt1....Opt20FirstName2Surname2Company2Email2Opt1....Opt20FirstName3Surname3Company3Email3Opt1....Opt20
If you don't follow that format a parser will be activated and
will extract the email addresses from the text.
Pasting from the clipboard
You can also import recipients from the clipboard. Just copy
your the text from any aplication and then select the 'Edit | Paste
Special' menu. The format to follow is the same as above. You can
for example copy an Excel sheet columns and paste them to the
recipient list. First column should be Firstname, then Surname,
Company followed by email address.
From Plain Text
This option lets you import recipients by copying and pasting
any kind of text. MaxBulk Mailer will extract the email addresses
from the text using the built-in parser. You don't have to follow
any specific format. It can be a bunch of email addresses separated
by commas such as:
[email protected],[email protected],[email protected],[email protected],[email protected],[email protected],[email protected],[email protected],[email protected],[email protected]
From Apple Mail, Microsoft Entourage, Eudora and PowerMail
You can extract email addresses from messages stored in a given
folder or mailbox inside Apple Mail, Microsoft Entourage, Eudora
and PowerMail. Just select the corresponding menu from the Import
button or the 'File | Import Recipients' menu. Note that the folder
has to be a root folder, a folder inside another folder.
Look at theFAQfor more information about importing addresses
from Entourage Address Book.
From Mac OS X Address Book and Now Contact
You can import recipients from the Mac OS X Address Book and Now
Contact. Note that MaxBulk Mailer also supports VCARD imports so
you can easily add recipients from Mac OS X Address Book to MaxBulk
simply dragging and dropping one or many entries at the same time
(note that you may have to drag the entries to your desktop first
and then from your desktop to MaxBulk Mailer). In addition you can
use the 'Import from the Address Book' menu to import by group and
with extended fields choosing to limit the number of email
addresses per entry and the possibility to overwrite the current
list with the new values.
From a remote Database(Pro only)
You can import records from a remote mySQL or postgreSQL
database. In both cases you need to provide the host name, the port
if different from the default one (mySQL:3303, postgreSQL:5432),
your account ID and your password, the database name, the number of
columns your query is supposed to return, and the query itself. You
have to line-up the expected cursor columns with MaxBulk's in order
for the data to get inserted in the right places. Feel free to
select an encoding if the response is not ASCII and activate or not
the duplicate checking.
Note that a remote server can be configured to only accept
requests from a script running on this same server. Contact your
provider if you can't manage to get access from MaxBulk Mailer.
From a Web page
You can import email addresses from a web page. You just need to
drag and drop the URL of the page from your browser to the
recipient list or select the 'File | Import Recipients | From a Web
page' menu. The page is then downloaded, processed in the
background and all the email addresses added to your list. You can
drag and drop or select as many URLs as you wish to get them
processed and results added to the same list.
Batch processes:
To remove several addresses from a list at once create a plain
text file named 'DELETE', add all the addresses to remove to it,
save it and drop it onto the list to process inside MaxBulk
Mailer.
To unsubscribe several addresses from a list at once create a
plain text file named 'UNSUBSCRIBE', add all the addresses to
unsubscribe to it, save it and drop it onto the list to process
inside MaxBulk Mailer.
To keep addresses from a list create a plain text file named
'KEEP', add all the addresses to keep, save it and drop it onto the
list to process inside MaxBulk Mailer. All other e-mails will be
removed.
To deactivate addresses from a list create a plain text file
named 'DEACTIVATE', add all the addresses to deactivate, save it
and drop it onto the list to process inside MaxBulk Mailer.
Exporting a list:
To export a list select the 'File | Export Recipients' menu. You
can select the columns you want to export by dragging them from one
list to the other and set their order. You can also set the
separator between Tab, Comma, Colon and Semicolon, the text
encoding and the type of recipients depending on their statuses. As
a result you can fully tailor the output file depending on your
needs.
Cc and Bcc(Pro only)
Cc stands for 'Carbon Copy'. It allows you to send a copy of
each message to one or several addresses. Bcc stands for 'Blind
Carbon Copy', it is the same as Cc but the addresses remain hidden
to the recipients. A copy of each message means that for a delivery
of 2,500 recipients and the Cc or the Bcc set to yourself you would
receive 2,500 copies. In case of messages personalized with tags
you would receive them as the real recipient will. This feature is
embedded with the Quick Selector so click on the disclosure
triangle on the left of the Lists selector pull-down menu to get it
displayed. The Cc and the Bcc fields both support tags.6.-
SettingsBefore being able to send a message you need to create at
least one email account. The 'Settings' panel allows you to create
as many accounts as you need and lets you choose from a wide range
of delivery options. Typing the settings is actually the hardest
part since you have to know several server related data such as the
SMTP address, your user ID, your password and the authentication
scheme you have to use. This information was given to you by your
ISP or your web hosting company at some time and you are very
likely using those settings already with your other email software.
You will find below a detailed description of each
field.-SMTPhost:Your SMTP host address and port if different from
default (address:port).-SSL:To establish a SSL v2, SSL v2/3, SSL v3
or a TLS v1 secure connection (Pro Only).-From:Your email address
in the [email protected]:The name that will appear in the
'From' header.-Reply-To:Optional header you can use to get replies
sent to a different email address.-Errors:Optional header you can
use to get the errors sent to a different email
address.-Signature:Your signature. It will be appended to your
message. (Plain text format only)
Select an authentication scheme. Possible choices are None, POP,
ESMTP and APOP. Authentication schemes are mechanisms to verify
your identity prior being granted to send a message through a
server. It is usually done by providing a user ID, a password and
by selecting an authentication method.
POP and APOP Authentication:-POPServer:The POP server address
and port if different from default.-Account ID:Your account
ID.-Password:The password to access this POP account.-SSL:To
establish a SSL v2, SSL v2/3, SSL v3 or a TLS v1 secure connection
(Pro Only).
ESMTP Authentication:-Account ID:Your account ID.-Password:The
password to access this ESMTP account.-Authentication type:From
Login (Default), Plain, MD5 Challenge-Response
Note that the Port parameter is optional on both the SMTP and
the POP server address. Provide a port number only in the case you
are not using the SMTP default port 25 or the POP default port 110
(Secure SSMTP 465 and SPOP3 995 respectively).
The Authentication setting is almost always required and some
server-side anti-spam software may look for an Authentication
header to determine whether your message is legitimate.
Connections:MaxBulk Mailer lets you open several simultaneous
connections to your SMTP server. With a fast internet connection
this can speed up email delivery quite significantly, but with a
modem connection, you should keep it to one or two connections
only. You should also double-check your agreement with your ISP as
to how many SMTP connections you are allowed to use at once. Note
that using 20 connections is not necessarily faster than with 5
connections because of your system resources and your connection
bandwidth.
Burst Mode:MaxBulk Mailer offers the possibility to open several
simultaneous connections to as many different servers as you wish.
Burst Mode is simply the possibility to use more than one server at
once. All you need is at least two servers. You can activate this
option by selecting the 'Burst Mode' menu from the Server pull-down
menu and by checking the servers you want to use from the list.
MaxBulk Mailer will then use the servers you have selected with
their corresponding settings. Note that this feature is closely
related to the 'Connections' setting thus using 10 connections with
2 servers will open 5 connections per server.
Group Mails:Your server may limit the number of messages that
can be sent during a session. You can easily match your server
requirements by using the Group Mails option to specify how many
messages have to be sent on each session and by setting an Interval
between each batch. The bigger is your group setting and the
smaller is you interval, the faster you will finish but the more
likely you're ISP will flag your message as spam.
Bulk Preferences:If you don't use the personalization options of
MaxBulk Mailer, you are missing out on one of its' most powerful
features. However, you can speed up the processing and the delivery
of your messages that aren't personalized by deactivating the
'Singly' option. If the 'Singly' option is activated messages are
sent one by one, showing the recipient "To:" header and allowing
the email-merge tags to be replaced by their corresponding values
depending on each entry. If the 'Singly' option is deactivated
messages are sent to all recipients at once. It is called the Bulk
mode. Note that in both cases your list is never sent to the
recipients. In bulk mode the Default 'To' header is automatically
set to 'Undisclosed-Recipients'. You can change that text to
whatever you prefer. In bulk mode it is highly recommended to use
small groups rather than 'All at once' to avoid 'Insufficient
storage' SMTP errors. The precedence option can slightly impact the
delivery priority by informing the server about the nature of the
message.
Signature:The signature is a piece of text that will be appended
to your message. We recommend you to consider using it to indicate
how your recipients can unsubscribe from your list. It is also
worth considering reminding people of why they are on your list
and/or how they subscribed to it, particularly if you only use it
once a month or less. Note that the signature only applies to
messages in the Plain Text format.
Once you are finished with your settings you can save your
account by selecting the "Save new account as..." menu from the
account pull-down menu or by clicking on the 'Save' button.7.-
PreviewMaxBulk Mailer 'Preview' panel allows you to easily check
how your final message looks like, once tags have been processed,
all the pictures have been placed and the signature has been
appended. It also allows you to check all the message headers and,
in the case they contain tags, whether they include the intended
data. You can check each individual record by using the left and
right arrows on the top left.Built-in preview is able to display
all the message formats supported by MaxBulk Mailer from 'Plain
Text' to 'Web Page'. However, if your message contains styles or
HTML code, you may want to preview it using a standard browser as
well. You can do that by using the 'Preview in Browser' (eye icon)
pull-down menu and by selecting a browser from the list (Default
Browser, Safari, Internet Explorer, Netscape Navigator, Opera,
Mozilla or iCab). That list also contains a 'View Source' menu to
display the HTML source behind a given rendered HTML message.
Old email software may rewrap incoming messages to 72 characters
per line following the 'Philip Bar' formatting. This has historical
reasons dating back to days when all email was plain text and
expected to fit on a 80 column by 24 (or 25) line screen. To make
email that had been forwarded easy to read when the quoting
character, usually a ', '', '