Email campaign problems, is it me or sugar?

[clegends]

Hi Folks, is it me or is it Sugar? I'm about to ditch Sugar for something else entirely, perhaps ......, if I can't figure out what's going on with sending Campaign emails. I've read and re-read all the documentation, followed links in the forums, and still there seem to be multiple, buggy problems. I'm happy to accept it's not sugar, and the application works fine, I'm even happy on that note to consider buying support, but at the moment I'm about to give up. Can anyone shed some light on this for me?

Issues:

1. Emails don't always send, but often stay in the 'send attempts 1' 'checked' category permanently. I must then erase them.

2. After they are erased, they still come back to haunt me. I created a new campaign some months ago, most of which never sent. I erased them all. Now when I send a campaign these old erased messages are getting sent bit by bit. MONTHS OLD EMAILS GETTING SENT OUT TO POTENTIAL CUSTOMERS! ARRRGHHH!!!!

3. I just created a new campaign, with 80 contacts, put them in the queue, and waited. Nothing happened. I set them to launch yesterday morning... nothing. I went to the admin panel and 'email queue'. Then I clicked on 'send emails'. 5 sent. Clicked again. 10 sent... clicked again until they were all sent. Granted I have the settings to send 20 emails at a time, as the server I'm using requires this, but shouldn't this happen automatically? Why do I have to click 'Send email queue' each time?

4. With the new campaign I've just started, only 36 out of 80 emails are recorded as being 'attempted'. Where did the rest go? Is this a cache problem, Sugar problem, or something I'm doing wrong?

As mentioned before, I'm happy to consider buying support if this will fix the problem. I'm using SugarCRM community edition 5.0.0f. While I consider many of the features invaluable, email marketing is crucial to my business. I'm already using the Thunderbird plugin by assertiva as my main email client, as, while much improved from previous versions, the native Ajax client leaves a lot to be desired. So here's my question: is there a workaround, a way to improve the campaign emails program, or are there simply settings to paly with I'm not familiar with yet? If I can't figure this out, I'm forced to ditch sugar for something better. Thanks

~clegends

[jnovak]

I am having the same problems sending e-mail campaigns. I got this reference from malcolmh but don't understand everything in it.

Look in the Wiki, perhaps here http://www.sugarcrm.com/wiki/index.php?title=How_to_campaign_(i.e._removeme.php )_external%2C_the_rest_internal%3F

I would really like to get this campaign stuff working but have been unsuccessful for the most part.

Thanks,
John Novak

Sugar Version (5.0.0f)
Sugar Edition (Community Edition)
Category (Campaigns Module)
Operating System (Fedora Core 4)
PHP Version (5.0.4)

[clegends]

Hi jnvorak, things are slowly becoming clearer. Firstly, thanks for that link, but there's nothing there in that part of the wiki right now... being created perhaps?

Issues 1 and 3 are still a problem, but I'm on my way to resolving the other 2. For the contacts that keep getting resent, I had them sending from a newsletter campaign that was scheduled to send monthly...lol. Enough said. To use this feature, I believe you need to keep the emails that will be sent up to date. Wich would make sense, actually. I wonder if there is a feature to stoop them from sending the same messages over and over again? This would be very useful.

For issue 4, Sugar was working perfectly. I hadn't gone through my contacts for some time, and many of the old emails were no longer valid... yesterday was spent cleaning up those accounts. I haven't tried anymore email campaigns yet, but will again shortly.

Could someone else explain about issues 1 and 3 above? Why do emails sometimes remain in the 'checked' category in 'admin>manage email queues' permanently, and never leave? What makes this happen to begin with? Also, why do Ii have to keep clicking on the 'send emails' button in the same place? Shouldn't this happen automatically? Some of my contacts from that target list are without email, or valid email addresses, so this may explain why only five or 10 are sent per click, but shouldn't they send up to 20 at a time (which is how I've configured it to send), and continue doing this until all are sent? What am I doing wrong? Cheers.

~clegends

[jnovak]

When I clicked the link it did not work. When I searched the Wiki here iswhat I found:

How to campaign (i.e. removeme.php) external, the rest internal?
From SugarCRM Wiki
Let's say you run Sugar within your internal network, but you want the campaign links (removeme.php, image.php, campaign_tracker.php) to be on your public website...

1. create or choose a directory on your external site that is forbidden to normal users - e.g. HTTP AUTH protected, etc.

2. create a php file in this folder called 'sugar_location.php', which contains: (replace with your own info where necessary)

<?php
$sugarlocation = 'http://{internal server ip or address}:{port}/{path/to/real/campaign/files}';
?>
3. create a file called 'redirect.php' in that folder. it will contain the following:

<?php

require_once('sugarlocation.php');

function selfURL() {
$s = empty($_SERVER["HTTPS"]) ? '' : ($_SERVER["HTTPS"] == "on") ? "s" : "";
$protocol = strleft(strtolower($_SERVER["SERVER_PROTOCOL"]), "/").$s;
$port = ($_SERVER["SERVER_PORT"] == "80") ? "" : (":".$_SERVER["SERVER_PORT"]);
return $protocol."://".$_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'].$port.$_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'];
}

function strleft($s1, $s2) { return substr($s1, 0, strpos($s1, $s2)); }

$currenturl = selfURL();
$urlarray = parse_url( $currenturl );
$redirecturl = $sugarlocation . '/' . $urlarray["path"] . '?' . $urlarray["query"];
$captured = file_get_contents( $redirecturl );
echo $captured;
?>
4. create a new php file for each of the three external campaign php files, but in a publicly accessible area of your external site. in each file, put the following: the require_once should reference the location and file you created in step #3 above. all three files should contain the same thing:

<?php
require_once('/some/path/to/forbidden/area/of/your/external/site/redirect.php');
?>
N.B. Now, when visitors go to http://your.external.site.com/image.php, it will actually pull contents from (and execute php in doing so) from sugar, wherever it lives. You will need to poke a hole in your firewall for the external site to read from your internal sugar. You could add authentication to the connection if so desired, but that's left up to you. Reply With Quote

Retrieved from "http://www.sugarcrm.com/wiki/index.php?title=How_to_campaign_%28i.e._removeme.p hp%29_external%2C_the_rest_internal%3F"
This page was last modified 11:17, 11 July 2007.
This page has been accessed 1,371 times.

Thanks,
John Novak

[clegends]

Thanks John, but I'm failing to see the link to my issues above. Just found a ferocious little bug, and I'm wondering if someone can explain this to me? Once again, if I buy support, is this able to be fixed? My email addresses seem to be slowly disappearing....what's going on? Now you see them, now you don't. Is it time for me to switch from Sugar?

Periodically my contacts emails just disappear? What the heck could be causing this? Email addresses are sacred to my business... I hate calling up to ask for them again, only to hear "but we gave them to you already!" Any thoughts?
~clegends

[Enable1T.Mike]

Re Problem no.2
Are these emails which were once in the outbound queue which you deleted which now keep getting sent (even though you look in the queue and they are not there) when you try and send any other queued mails?
If the answer is yes, I have found the reason for it.
The emailman table is normally set to empty when mails have been sent, however when you "delete" mails from the queue (from with Sugar) they are simply marked as Deleted = 1.
As Sugar does not appear to check the deleted status (presuming mails in the emailman table are to be sent, as sent items are removed) it sends them all again.
Simply empty the emailman table and your "ghost" emails from the past will stop being sent.

[clegends]

Re Problem no.2
Are these emails which were once in the outbound queue which you deleted which now keep getting sent (even though you look in the queue and they are not there) when you try and send any other queued mails?
If the answer is yes, I have found the reason for it.
The emailman table is normally set to empty when mails have been sent, however when you "delete" mails from the queue (from with Sugar) they are simply marked as Deleted = 1.
As Sugar does not appear to check the deleted status (presuming mails in the emailman table are to be sent, as sent items are removed) it sends them all again.
Simply empty the emailman table and your "ghost" emails from the past will stop being sent.

Hi matey, thanks so much for that. Where do I find the emailman table? I'm just about to ditch Sugar email for Thunderbird... Sugar's email just doesn't cut it. While I appreciate lots of improvements have been done, they are going to have to do better than that. I love the conceept of what's acheivable, but until it works it's just a fancy bit of bling which doesn't do much for me. I hope other users have a better experience than me. For now I'm going to be using Thunderbird with the Assertiva plugin, which can archive messages to my contacts in Sugar. WARNING to all potential users of Assertiva! I synced my contacts awhile back, and managed to create doubles of everything... am now having to go through and merge all my several hundred contacts.... thanks again.