How Outreach sends

Every Outreach message is an ordinary email from one of your team's Mail addresses. It is signed with the domain's key, stored in the mailbox's Sent folder, and its replies arrive in the same mailbox. Which server carries it to the person is the team's sending route, set by a team admin in Outreach → Settings.

The mailbox

A campaign sends from the mailbox chosen in its Edit details…. It must be an active Mail address on a domain whose records are verified, and the member who starts or resumes the campaign must be able to open it in Mail; the campaign then sends as that member. See Connect your own domain to Mail.

If the mailbox is removed, or that member loses access to it, Magpie pauses the campaign and emails the team's admins. Choose another mailbox and Resume.

The sending route

A team has no route until an admin chooses one, and no campaign can start without it.

• Your own SMTP server: messages go through a server you have an account with, such as Amazon SES or Postmark. Only each campaign's daily cap paces them.
• Your sending server: messages go through a server you rent that Magpie set up for the team (Set up a sending server for Outreach). It is an SMTP server like any other, with its details filled in by the setup.
• Magpie's route: messages go through Magpie's mail server, at most 60 an hour from each mailbox. It is available only to teams Magpie has allowed; otherwise use your own SMTP server.

Your SMTP server

Your SMTP server in Outreach settings asks for the Host, the Port, the Encryption (STARTTLS, usually port 587; TLS, usually port 465; or none), and a User name and Password if the server needs them. The password is stored encrypted and never shown again; leave it empty to keep the one stored.

Save and send a test sends a test message through the server, from the Mail address chosen in Send the test from, to your own address. Campaigns can send through the server only once a test passes. If it fails, the settings page shows the server's answer under Your SMTP server.

Your server's own sending limits still apply: a send it refuses is a failed send.

Your sending server

Once Magpie has set a server up for the team, the settings page names it as the route. Saving Your SMTP server by hand replaces it with the details you typed; the server itself is unchanged, and Set up again on the sending server page makes it the route once more. See Set up a sending server for Outreach.

Stopping all sending

The Sending band at the top of the Outreach page has one button. Stop all sending holds every campaign in the team at once: from that moment no message leaves, running campaigns keep their place, nothing is paused, and nobody is emailed. Anyone who can edit Outreach can press it. While sending is stopped, the band says who stopped it and when, a campaign cannot be started or resumed, and Send a test is refused. A sending server that is being set up still sends its own check message to the team's mailbox.

Start sending again is for a team admin. Campaigns carry on inside their send windows, under their daily caps, from where they were.

How fast a campaign sends

A campaign sends only inside its send window, in its time zone, and at most its daily cap in a day, 50 unless you change it. Sends are spread evenly through the window, one at a time, so a campaign's 50 messages arrive over the day rather than all at once. Each campaign is paced on its own.

A follow-up step is due the number of days after the person's previous step, at the same time of day. If that is outside the window, it is sent when the window next opens.

Mail's own hourly limit for a mailbox counts the mail you write by hand as well. If the mailbox has reached it, Outreach waits 5 minutes and tries again; it is not counted as a failure.

Failed sends

When a server refuses a message or does not answer within 30 seconds, the send is tried again after 5 minutes, then 15, then 60. After the fourth failure the person's page shows the server's answer, and the send is tried again a day later. After 5 failed sends in a row, Magpie pauses the campaign, emails the team's admins, and the campaign's page shows why. Fix the route or the mailbox, then Resume.

Magpie can also hold a team's Outreach, for example after many complaints. Nothing is sent while it is held, and the settings page says why.

Bounces

When an address does not exist, the person's server sends back a delivery report. Magpie reads it from the mailbox: the person becomes Bounced, nothing more is sent to them, and the address goes on the team's do-not-email list. A report that only says delivery is delayed is recorded and changes nothing.

If sending does something this page does not explain, Contact support.