A bounced e-mail (or bounce-back) is one that never arrives in the recipient's inbox and is sent back, or bounced back, to the sender with an error message that indicates to the sender that the e-mail was never successfully transmitted. Typically, this happens when you send your mailings using Smtp servers: if an address is non-existent, Smtp server (which has no way of knowing it) will accept the message anyway, but it will be bounced later. There are two main types of bounce-backs:
- Hard bounces: the e-mail could not be delivered due to a permanent error (i.e. non-existent address)
- Soft bounces: A temporary condition exists causing the email delivery to fail (i.e. the recipient's mail server is temporarily busy)
SendBlaster can automatically recognize most bounced e-mails and unsubscribe or delete bounced addresses in the selected list. Bounced mails will be sent to the mailing's sender address, which may not be the same address used for subscriptions and cancellations. Therefore it is necessary to tell the program which address should be checked.
Which email address should I enter for bounce-backs management?
Remember that e-mail bounces are sent to the mailing's sender address, not to the address used for subscriptions.
Suppose you chose subscriptions@mysite.com as your subscriptions managing address for List 1, and you later sent your mailings from newsletter@mysite.com address. Bounce-backs will therefore be delivered to newsletter@mysite.com, and this is the address you will have to configure in Manage bounce-backs section for List 1.
The address to check is set by typing the correct parameters to access its POP3 account, just like any e-mail client software: besides the address (E-mail) you need to specify the receiving server (POP3 Server), which, if needed, may include port number in the "server:port" format, the Username and the Password. The SSL checkbox enables SSL communication, which may be needed by some pop3 servers (a typical example is Gmail's server). In the Timeout field you can type the number of seconds of inactivity after which the connection will be closed. To verify the parameters just click on Test connection button (no message will be downloaded). When Keep a copy of the messages on the server is checked, SendBlaster will download new messages without deleting them from the server. The messages will then be available for future uses. New messages will be ignored. If Delete bounced addresses is checked, bounced addresses will be deleted from the selected list. If not, they will just be unsubscribed from the list. By checking Process hard bounces and Process soft bounces you can choose which bounce types (see above) should be processed; of course if neither option is checked no bounced e-mails processing will occur. By clicking on the Download button, the new messages will be downloaded and the selected distribution list will be updated (as well as all other lists that use the same e-mail address for bounce-backs).
Warning: if the download of new messages appears to be rather slow, this might indicate that on the e-mail server many messages have piled up: disable the Keep a copy of the messages on the server option and click on Download (or execute downloading on your standard e-mail client). The messages, once downloaded, will be removed form the server and the following downloads will be faster.