At this site, PHPList, a free open source mailing program was used to communicate and provide people with information. Currently ALO Easy Mail News Letter is the mail list solution being implemented at this site, in lieu of PHPList. See the News Letter Page to subscribe.
Unfortunately PHPList has some serious complications which do not make it a useful and effective subscription mail system.
Some of the complications are:
1. As with anything these days, there is a learning curve, where a technically oriented person may not have much of problem, but most ordinary users of on-line mail systems do not need, want or desire to sort through techno mumble jumble to figure out how to get the program to work and continue to work with the least amount of hassle. The program is written in PHP and does work well when properly implemented, but you need to be a little tech savvy to keep up with making changes in the environment.
2. Any time someone unsubscribes from the PHPList mail system their email address is automatically black listed in the system. Black Listing means their email address cannot be used in the PHPList mail system again, until a system administrator manually removes the email address from the Black List.
As an alternative to unsubscribing (which users do when they do not want mail for a while ie….vacations, not interested right now), a separate Stop Mail can be used within the system for users to reside on in lieu of their normal list.
As far as Black Listing in PHPList and any email system, this should always be an option for the user and the system administrator, not something that happens automatically. if a user unsubscribes.
PHPList can be used in a number of ways to subscribe users to lists within the mailing system.
The best way to build a list with any mailing program is to have visitors submit a request to be placed on a list and then have them click on a confirm link, sent to their request email address, that confirms they did the initial request and want to be placed on the list.
One method of subscription used within PHPList is a double opt-in procedure.
What does double opt-in mean?
1) A visitor submits a request to be placed on a mail list to receive information from a mail list. The visitor request is considered step one or the first opt-in.
2) That visitor receives a confirmation email from the requested mail list and then confirms their request to have their email address placed on that list to receive information from that list. The confirmation email sent to the visitor’s request email address contains a link that must be clicked on by the visitor to return a confirmation to the system. If the visitor does not respond by confirming, then the visitor cannot be placed on a list to receive information
Randomly sending emails from any mailing system, to people who have not given their permission to receive the information is considered SPAM, whether it is personal or business emails.
The mailing system at this site allows people to be subscribed to one list, multiple lists, a Stop Mail List* or to have their email address Black Listed** within the system.
* A Stop Mail List selection is provided as a list selection, for all members and must be selected as a subscription within the system, in order to avoid having your email address Black Listed within the system. When selecting the Stop Mail List subscription, you must unsubscribe from all other lists in order to emails from those lists. If you unsubscribe from all lists within this system and fail to select the Stop Mail List at the same time, a message will be sent to your email address notifying you that your email address is about to be Black Listed within the system.
** Black Listed means your email address is placed on an internal list within the system that disallows your email address to be used within the system again forever. For your email address to be used in the system again, you must contact the system administrator and specifically request to have your email address removed from the Black List. This is a manual process, but as an alternative you can always subscribe with a different email address.
PHPList also allows list members to be added and confirmed as subscribers by a Super Admin in the mailing system. But in all cases of any subscriber existing on any mailing system list anywhere, you must have a subscriber request and you must have a subscriber confirmation that directly correlates to the mailing system the subscriber exists in. If you do not have that information for every subscriber on your list, then you may be considered a Spammer sending Unsolicited Commercial Email (UCE) and you risk serious damage to your on-line reputation and pocketbook. You also may be subject to black listing, stiff fines and penalties, jail time and more than likely never be able to do business on-line again, ever.
A nice simple rule to follow concerning any commercial emails you send is to not send it, unless you can prove they asked for it and confirmed their request to receive it.
Can you maintain an external database or files of system of requests and confirmations for all of your mailing list subscribers?
Yes you can and should at all times, since all software can fail at any given time and the odds are it will fail when most needed. As long as you can prove you do have the proper information for your subscribers, and provide it when requested, then you should be fine.
Mailing Lists are an integral part of everyday business for some business people, while other business folks could care less about having a mailing list or receiving mail from one.
In business it is important to keep people informed. There are many options to choose from on how to inform your regular customers, site visitors and new business prospects.
Setting up and maintaining a mail list is only one of those options.
