41. WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW T his chapter outlines some key concepts and questions that are useful for planning the use of CiviCRM's email capabilities. T his chapter should be read before you start sending emails to contacts.
KEY CONCEPTS As you might expect for a web-based CRM, email plays a central role in CiviCRM. Broadly speaking, there are three situations in which email is sent from CiviCRM: as part of workflows that happen in other components, for example, an event registration confirmation email to individuals and small groups of people (via the Send email action) as a mass mailing via CiviMail. A substantial part of this section deals with CiviMail, but it will also be useful if you are using other components of CiviCRM that interact with email without enabling CiviMail. Every email sent, via the Send email action or using CiviMail, is treated as an activity and stored in the activity history of each recipient so you can see, for example, that John Doe made a donation three days after he received your April newsletter.
Send email and CiviMail When the CiviMail component is enabled, CiviCRM offers two options for sending email to contacts: send an email as an activity for a contact: this is suitable for sending emails to individuals and small groups send a Mailing to a group using CiviMail: this is ideal for mass mailings or scheduled emails to small groups. T here are crucial differences between the Send email action and the CiviMail component: emails sent via the Send email action are limited to a maximum of 50 email addresses, and there is no reporting other than an activity record for each recipient CiviMail emails have sophisticated bounce processing and reporting CiviMail allows recipients to manage their own subscriptions CiviMail can be configured to automatically track replies. CiviMail requires more work to configure and there are more steps involved in sending each email than using the core email functionality within CiviCRM; however, once you have enabled and configured CiviMail you will have greatly enhanced mass email capabilities. Working out which method to use for each email might not be immediately apparent. Over time, the best practices and the right tool for each situation will become more obvious and can be shared among your users.
When to use the Send email action T he advantage of sending emails to your contacts via CiviCRM is that each email is recorded as an activity with a contact, allowing other staff members to easily determine whether a contact was sent a particular message. It is also a quicker option than setting up a mass mailing as long as you are contacting fewer than 50 recipients. T he Send email activity offers all the functionality of an email client: you can attach files, CC and BCC contacts, and use message templates. T his option is available even when the CiviMail component is disabled.
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