We’re sorry, but we cannot and must not offer e-mail marketing services for privacy reasons. German privacy laws are very strict and as a company we would quickly run into problems if we do not require our clients to also adhere to these stringent regulations. Therefore, clients will find a clause that limits their options to send bulk e-mails via ConfTool in our contract. If clients sent out bulk e-mails via our servers, recipients could classify such mails as unwanted or spam. Consequently, our servers could be listed on so called black lists, which in turn would lead to all e-mails sent from our servers being flagged as spam by servers of the recipients. In the past, we had to fill in numerous reapplication and statement forms so that our servers would again be whitelisted.
If you want to send out a newsletter by e-mail, please consider that it’s always advisable to use the double opt-in procedure. The privacy laws of many EU countries like Germany even require to use this procedure. An explanation can be found at:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opt-in_email#Confirmed_opt-in_(COI)/Double_opt-in_(DOI)ConfTool Pro can be used to send bulk mails to your authors, reviewers and participants. But please consider that the use of this function is only authorized to send
necessary e-mails and not for commercial mails or other mails that might be considered as unsolicited. The use of the bulk e-mail function of ConfTool is explained at:
https://www.conftool.net/en/administrator-documentation/bulk-e-mails.htmlBelow you can find
some companies that provide e-mail marketing services. If you want to advertise your event,
please do not include the ConfTool login URL, but rather add a link to your main website. Including a direct link to your ConfTool conference webpage again might result in our servers being deemed unwanted and blacklisted.
Mailchimphttps://mailchimp.com/Mailchimp offers a
free plan with which you can reach
up to 2,000 subscribers with a total of 10,000 e-mails per month and a daily send limit of 2,000. Mailchimp will include a small advertising banner in the footer to compensate for their free service. If you opt for one of the paid plans, the footer advertisement will be removed. Plans are available from $10/month to $300/month. Another option is to choose a prepaid plan: Pay as You Go credit blocks start at $150 for 5000 credits. Non-profit organizations can receive a 15% discount.
CleverReachhttps://www.cleverreach.com/en/Up to 250 recipients and 1,000 mails per month are free of charge at CleverReach. CleverReach has German, Italian and Spanish language support. Subscriber plans cost between €15/month and €495/month. There is also a
prepaid plan available, which could be a good option for users who send infrequently.
CleverReach stores all data on servers in the EU and considers the requirements of the GDPR.
Sendinbluehttps://www.sendinblue.com/pricing/Sendinblue is an online service with a multilingual user interface. You can manage and organize your contacts. Unlimited contacts are already possible with the free version. Subscription packages are available from 19 €/month.
Sendinblue stores all data in compliance with the GDPR on servers in the EUConstantContacthttps://www.constantcontact.com/ConstantContact is another e-mail marketing service. You can upload your contacts from Excel, Outlook, and many other formats. The monthly
fees are based on the number of contacts. Subscriber plans start at €18/month for the standard service or €40/month for the “Email Plus” service with more customization options and additional features. Non-profit organizations can even save up to 30%.
Rapidmailhttps://www.rapidmail.com/Rapidmail is an email marketing service that can be used for newsletter delivery, marketing automation, and transactional email.
The fees depend on the number of recipients and the number of emails sent per month. You can for instance choose between
the prepaid plan “Pay as you go” including a free trial version, a monthly plan for up to 500 recipients starting at €9/month or buy monthly credits with up to 5,000 emails for €40/month.
Rapidmail also stores all data on servers in the EU (Germany) and considers the requirements of the GDPR.
ConfTool Support Forum
Topic: Can ConfTool Pro be used to send out bulk mails to announce our event?