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Ken asked: “We have a Yahoo! account and a Gmail account. We work with a non-profit soup kitchen and are trying to send out group emails – about 200-250 emails at a time. Currently with both yahoo and Gmail, we can only send out 50 at a time, wait 24 hours and send 50 more. Is there a program or a way around, to be able to send more than that without them thinking it’s spam or phishing? Is there a way you can guide us?”
Sure thing! It’s a very simple answer, in fact. MailChimp. You know, many people are familiar with Constant Contact because they spend a ton of money on advertising, but MailChimp is every bit the equal of Constant Contact (and some might even say that MailChimp is the better platform).
MailChimp offers a free account where you can have up to 2,000 subscribers on your mailing list and send them up to 12,000 messages per month. If you only have 200 to 250 subscribers you want to email, then you could send them 48 to 60 emails per month without exceeding your maximum message count.
MailChimp offers a free account where you can have up to 2,000 subscribers
MailChimp has an integrated visual editor where you can design beautiful emails, and they offer some very nice templates as a starting point. There are a bundle of features offered with the free account, including delivery reports and MailChimp Mobile so you can track things from your smartphone.
There are additional features that are available only with paid accounts, but we guarantee you that you will have all your basic needs met by the free account, and probably even exceeded. You can sign up for free at mailchimp.com.
If you do decide that you need those additional features at some point, make sure to let them know you’re a non-profit. They offer a 15% discount for non-profits.