Mail2 Upgrade

We had a long conversation with the mail2 team today to troubleshoot some of the issues we've been having, and it helped a lot. I think the most important things to know if you HAVEN'T already migrated are (save this message for when you need it -- it will be too overwhelming now if you haven't migrated but will make sense once you're in process):

1. Before you migrate, save all of your current drafts as templates. This is really important. There may still be some funkiness with them, but it will be far worse than if you don't.

2. Once you migrate, you'll need to start new campaigns and link to those templates. Otherwise, if you try to use the original draft campaigns, you'll face all sorts of formatting problems and issues and want to pull your hair out.

3. All photo library links will change and will need to be updated.  This isn't really that hard, but something to be aware of as it will require additional time.

4. You'll want to update subscription preferences forms right off the bat. This is somewhat confusing, but also sort of makes sense once they walk you through it in detail.

5. Language has changed a LOT and is not always clear! Here's a cheat sheet:

Draft = campaign that has been completely filled out and is ready to accept contacts and ready to be scheduled (note: you now add contacts at the end of the cycle, rather than at the beginning, which makes more sense)

Incomplete = any draft campaign from the pre-migration period OR any campaign that hasn't had the "3rd step" of checking from name, links, analytics, etc. completed. 

Workflow = Any campaign that is an automatic scheduled campaign through Tessitura. You can also create non-Tessitura related workflows, which makes this terminology somewhat confusing (e.g., if you want to automatically re-send a campaign to someone who doesn't open it in a certain time period).

Mailing List = group

Dynamic Segment = saved search

6. Reporting data will not be brought over, but they will give you access to the legacy dashboard to be able to look at that.

7. Personally, I find the dashboard organization to be a bit of a mess. (If you're a zero inbox kind of person, you'll go nuts. I'm not, and I'm still going nuts.) All of the legacy campaigns from the past 18 months are brought over with the prefix SENT in the dashboard, which I find terribly confusing, especially when some of that content was drafts that hadn't been sent.

There were a few other things that were problematic at first, but some of them have been resolved in a fix that was pushed out yesterday.  I think the big thing to know is that even though they said the changes were all on their end, it will still take some time to sort through, and you'll want to have time built in to really dig into it.  I would expect that by the time you migrate, they will have sorted out some of the issues we were having.

Good luck, all!

Sara Billmann, UMS

We had a long conversation with the mail2 team today to troubleshoot some of the issues we've been having, and it helped a lot. I think the most important things to know if you HAVEN'T already migrated are (save this message for when you need it -- it will be too overwhelming now if you haven't migrated but will make sense once you're in process):

1. Before you migrate, save all of your current drafts as templates. This is really important. There may still be some funkiness with them, but it will be far worse than if you don't.

2. Once you migrate, you'll need to start new campaigns and link to those templates. Otherwise, if you try to use the original draft campaigns, you'll face all sorts of formatting problems and issues and want to pull your hair out.

3. All photo library links will change and will need to be updated.  This isn't really that hard, but something to be aware of as it will require additional time.

4. You'll want to update subscription preferences forms right off the bat. This is somewhat confusing, but also sort of makes sense once they walk you through it in detail.

5. Language has changed a LOT and is not always clear! Here's a cheat sheet:

Draft = campaign that has been completely filled out and is ready to accept contacts and ready to be scheduled (note: you now add contacts at the end of the cycle, rather than at the beginning, which makes more sense)

Incomplete = any draft campaign from the pre-migration period OR any campaign that hasn't had the "3rd step" of checking from name, links, analytics, etc. completed. 

Workflow = Any campaign that is an automatic scheduled campaign through Tessitura. You can also create non-Tessitura related workflows, which makes this terminology somewhat confusing (e.g., if you want to automatically re-send a campaign to someone who doesn't open it in a certain time period).

Mailing List = group

Dynamic Segment = saved search

6. Reporting data will not be brought over, but they will give you access to the legacy dashboard to be able to look at that.

7. Personally, I find the dashboard organization to be a bit of a mess. (If you're a zero inbox kind of person, you'll go nuts. I'm not, and I'm still going nuts.) All of the legacy campaigns from the past 18 months are brought over with the prefix SENT in the dashboard, which I find terribly confusing, especially when some of that content was drafts that hadn't been sent.

There were a few other things that were problematic at first, but some of them have been resolved in a fix that was pushed out yesterday.  I think the big thing to know is that even though they said the changes were all on their end, it will still take some time to sort through, and you'll want to have time built in to really dig into it.  I would expect that by the time you migrate, they will have sorted out some of the issues we were having.

Good luck, all!

Sara Billmann, UMS