SMTP Relay
Email communication with your users and members is an important aspect of the association. The hope would be for all of your intended recipients to receive your emails in their Inbox without any barriers.
Email communication from NetForum is dependent on an SMTP server to relay email to the SMTP and be sent to your recipients. NetForum is essentially a mail client for sending - it is not a mail server by itself.
You’re able to select the SMTP Service that would work best for your association, we don’t limit you to a specific SMTP.
SMTP configuration is primarily based on system option configuration, which we will cover later in this document.
SMTP relay is managed through a client owned SMTP or other SMTP relay service.
System Option Setup
- enableSendEmail: This option configures NetForum email functionality for confirmation emails and email messaging functions. If enabled, NetForum will send emails, otherwise emails will not be sent by NetForum. For security reasons, the default is disabled.
- EmailMode: EmailMode should be set to 'Live' on a live site and 'Test' on a test site. Default Value is Live.
- EmailModeTestDomains: This system option determines which email addresses are allowed to receive communications when the EmailMode system option is set to test. Values should be separated by a semicolon. An example value would be @momentivesoftware.com;@abc.org
- EmailNotifyFrom: The EmailNotifyFrom address is used as the Sent From email address. EmailNotifyFrom is the default Sent From email address for: Contact Request Assignments/Task, Call To Action, Dues Invoice Confirmation, Guest Book, Invoice Confirmation, Job Bank, and Communicate page. This value must be a syntactically legal email address.
-
SMTPServer: This is the email server address that an organization uses to generate, receive, and store email. Using your own SMTP relay will ensure email to your members comes from the association and should have a higher delivery rate.
-
SMTPPort: Specifies the smtp port to use for email. If left blank, the default port is used (25). Use port 587 for encrypted email transmissions using SMTP Secure (SMTPS).
-
SmtpUserName: Specifies the smtp username to use for authenticated smtp. Works in conjunction with the SmtpPassword option.
-
SmtpPassword: Specifies the smtp password for authenticated smtp. Works in conjunction with the SmtpUserName option. If both options are populated, the credentials are passed to the smtp server for authentication, otherwise anonymous smtp is assumed.
-
SMTPOutboundRetry: Controls the number of retries when an outbound SMTP error is caught. Default is 3. If you don't want NetForum to retry sending email messages after an outbound error is detected, set this value to 0.
- Some SMTP servers may require SSL to be enabled – which means it uses the Secure Sockets Layer to encrypt the connection to the SMTP mail server. This can be done through lines added in the web config files and NetForum Messaging config file. Contact support if you need assistance with enableSSL in mail settings.
Reporting Email Configuration
If you would like to send reports through email, the email settings will need to be added on the Report Services Configuration Manager in your Report Server, which in most cases will be your SQL Server. Some associations may have a dedicated Report Server if resource intensive reporting is run regularly.
To send reports via email, connect to the report server and update the “Email Settings” in “Report Services Configuration Manager”.
Email Settings:
- Sender Address: use the value from the “EmailNotifyFrom” system option
- SMTPServer: use the value from the “SMTPServer” system option
- Authentication: select “No Authentication” if no username/password is used for the SMTP; or select “Basic authentication” and use “SMTPUserName” and “SMTPPassword” as the user and password.
There are some additional things to consider for sending reports through email related to firewalls.
- You will need to whitelist the hosted report/sql server firewall ip on your firewall, which communication from NetForum report server will come through.
- You will need to request a firewall exception from hosting for email to be allowed to be sent from the report/sql server to your smtp server with the IP that should be allowed for outbound communication.
- If you are using an SMTP service with a large range of IPs, it may be optimal to allow all outbound communication from the SQL server to your smtp server over port 25 or port 587, depending which port you use.
- For Technical details, the settings from the “Report Services Configuration Manager” are saved in the Rsreportserver config file, which is located in the MSRS Reporting Services folder.
- You may need to edit and update the Rsreportserver config to set the SMTPServerPort to 587 for SMTPS, depending on your SMTPServer.
- If SSL is needed for reports, update Rsreportserver config to set SMTPUseSSL to True.
Email Templates, Marketing, Unsubscribe options
In order to maintain consistent email communication and allow for intricate email layouts, we have the ability to create and utilize Email Correspondence Templates in NetForum.
It is important to check and test the content of Email Templates - especially your Headers, Footers, Signature, and Sender information.If you are interested in improving the template to try and avoid the Junk folder, some recommendations would be to adjust the email template in your site to have an introduction line, signature, sender information, and other identifying information of the association to make the email look less like spam.
Format messages according to the Internet Message Format standard, RFC 5322.
When sending Email Marketing (non-transactional email), it’s recommended that you send emails to the recipients intentionally by opting for targeted Marketing efforts as opposed to mass outreach.
You can use various templates and then send those to different target audiences using Mailing Types and Mailing Lists.
Marketing messages should support unsubscribe options and include a clearly visible unsubscribe link in the message body.
You can include links to unsubscribe from specific Mailing Types and/or to unsubscribe from all Mailing Types. Those methods are explained here where Email Opt out is tracked per customer based on Mailing Types.
Customers can manage their Mail Preferences from their Profile in eWeb under Communication Preferences
For you to use the Email Header one-click unsubscribe – it currently can be done with the MailTo configuration in the Mail Server.
We understand the challenge that some of our users are encountering with email regulations; and to alleviate that our R&D team is working on a URL Post and MailTo option built into NetForum.
It is available beginning in Release 35 and makes it easier for NetForum users to implement one-click unsubscribe in the Email Header through configuration options.
Domain Tasks
SPF
SPF (which is Sender Policy Framework), is a simple email-validation system designed to detect email spoofing by providing a mechanism to allow receiving mail exchangers to check that incoming mail from a domain comes from a host authorized by the domain's administrators.
It’s ultimately an anti-spam approach in which the Internet domain of an email sender can be authenticated for that sender, thereby discouraging spam mailers, who routinely disguise the origin of their email, using email spoofing.
Your TXT record is found and maintained in your DNS configuration. This is a basic example of a DNS with the TXT record and option to Add SPF Record.
It is recommended to confirm your DNS records TXT has the necessary SPF configured, which you can check in various ways but one is through mxtoolbox TXT lookup
(referenced here in this image to include spf.protection.outlook.com and spf.abila.info).
You can check your postmaster to check for spam reports and monitor those for commonalities and areas for improvement, especially if spam becomes a problem for you. You can also work with your IT team to do that monitoring of spam reports if needed.
DKIM
DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail) is recommended by most email providers.
It basically attempts to verify whether mail is legitimate, using email authentication by adding a digital signature to outgoing messages.
Our recommendation is to use an SMTP provider that can support DKIM and configure it with your IT team.
A basic overview of the setup is:
1. Configure DKIM to Generate the Key Pair
The applicable tool depends on the operating system.
2. Create the Public Key as a TXT Record in the DNS Settings
After your DNS provider is selected, update its settings as needed.
3. Generate and Save the DKIM-Signature
Ensure email delivery by applying a unique signature to your messages.
reference: https://mxtoolbox.com/dmarc/dkim/setup/how-to-setup-dkim
If your company sends messages from third-party providers, DKIM set up is required for each, so be sure to verify that all of your outbound domains apply this protocol.
DMARC
DMARC (Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance) is recommended by most email providers.
It suggests what to do with mail that isn't legitimate.
So with DKIM, it’s used to verify mail is legitimate and with DMARC it’s used for filtering out mail that isn’t legitimate.
DMARC doesn't depend on the SMTP server for configuration and is configured in the DNS.
For setup, we recommend referencing mxtooloxk dmarc setup.
DMARC can be configured in your TXT record within your DNS provider, similar to SPF.
You can configure DMARC records to specify to take no action on certain scenarios so that mail is not accidentally quarantined or rejected, also shown in the example image where you see it is set to none for the email address specified as the sender.