Switching email service providers can seem like a daunting and tricky undertaking for businesses. Even when it’s clear that by moving ESP or email relay, your business would benefit from a better service and potentially a better deal, the task can deter you. Without a doubt, there are numerous pitfalls that businesses can face when they decide to move email service provider. It’s a time-consuming process, involving moving valuable data, such as contacts and significant reporting information. Protecting these assets is important, because any problem could cause a hiatus in your operations, causing your revenue stream to suffer.
That’s scary, and it’s certainly something everyone wants to avoid. However, switching your email service vendor doesn’t need to be so intimidating. With some clear thinking, good planning and sensible preparation, you can help to ensure that a transition to a new ESP is as smooth as possible for your business. Furthermore, remember that moving email service providers is done for a very important fundamental reason: it’s good for the business. It just needs to be done well.
How to effortlessly switch between ESPs
So, here are seven top tips to assist you through the process of switching email service provider. They’ll help you expedite the switch, maximize effectiveness and avoid costly mistakes, and will ensure that your move to a new ESP will be smooth and beneficial to your business. Follow them and you might find that what was previously a daunting prospect is something you could even enjoy.
1. Check if you’re set up on shared or dedicated IP addresses
Remember that if you have a dedicated IP, your activity can drastically affect your reputation, and you may have to gradually warm-up the address if your service provider hasn’t already done so.
2. Keep historical reporting data
You’ll need to decide how far back you want to keep your reporting data. Usually six months is enough. Remember to save actual numbers and not the percentages in the report, so that you have more flexibility with recalculating rates.
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3. Define your reporting criteria
Check how reporting metrics are defined, so that you can accurately compare the performance reports of your new ESP to the reporting on your previous system. For example, issues to consider are: how are the open rates calculated, divided by number of emails delivered before or after soft bounces.
4. List migration
If you are already handling the hassle of moving your active lists from one system to another, this is the perfect opportunity to do some data cleaning. Also, don’t forget to import unsubscribe and bounce lists. This may sound obvious, but can be easily overlooked, and all data could be lost. When this happens, you can create the potentially dangerous problem of including recipients on your lists that have already unsubscribed. They won’t be happy to receive unwanted emails. It’s not good practice, and it could damage your company’s reputation.
5. Update forms and tracking on websites
Your forms, sharing functions, unsubscribe links, sender address or post-click tracking all need updating. Make sure you go through your entire website to pick up on any of these issues.
6. CRM integration
Make sure your new email platform is integrated into your CRM system. This aspect of the move needs to be checked at the beginning of the move process, as it can increase the complexity and duration of the move project.
7. Train your staff
Change is always a challenge for teams, however beneficial it is. New things can take time for people to get used to and some may miss the familiar old systems. So, it’s important to get your team on board by helping them overcome the barrier of using a new system. You can achieve this by providing them with good training, by setting a clear cut off date when all activity needs to move to the new system and by communicating the benefits clearly.
Any killer tips to add? Let us know! @ info@ongage.com.
About Ongage:
Ongage is a revolutionary front-end email marketing platform that allows you to connect to more than 50 of the world’s leading email service providers, SMTP relays and MTAs. With our platform you can easily work with multiple email service vendors at the same time, test their deliverability and performance, and find the vendors that will optimize your activity and business operation.
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