Every brand which wishes to switch their Email Service Provider for sending their promotional and triggered emails faces the mammoth task of switching their email program completely to a new platform.
If you are a brand marketer, you may have to take a decision sometimes to switch your Email traffic to another ESP . It could be due to a contract expiry or you are facing an email delivery issue with your current ESP.
Then you just migrate your entire email program to another ESP like a smooth transition.
Easy right?
I am sorry to burst the bubble , but that is utopia! ESP switching is never that ideal.
Switching ESP and migrating volumes to several platforms is never an easy task and it gets more complicated when you are switching to new sending domain and using brand new settings with the new ESP.
Challenges faced while switching ESP
If you are migrating to a new sending domain with a new platform then there is a challenge for Gmail IP warmup where you will have to steadily increase your sending volumes for Gmail ids in order to build reputation and monitor it daily on Google Postmaster.
This creates a conundrum for a marketer who wishes to carry out a successful warmup process with Gmail, but at the same time limit the number of emails sent from this new domain. There is a question of how the rest of the volumes will be sent from the current ESP.
Scenarios like these can create a head scratching situations where the marketer has to divide the volumes between the two ESPs . On one hand they have to follow a strict warmup for new domain and on the other hand they have to continue their current triggered/promotional email program as it can’t be stopped due to business requirements.
Our deliverability consultants handle several clients who were in-between ESP switching and when we have a round of discussions with the brand before on-boarding them, there is a talk about mailing list to be targeted.
This leads to several challenges where the brands can’t commit that they will shift the entire data on to another platform due to their inability to stop their ongoing email program.
Thus, a small volume of active data is migrated to the other ESP and the rest is sent via earlier ESP till the full migration is done.
The migration of such incremental volumes continue till the full program is switched over a period of time.
This creates issues of an incomplete database to be sent via new domain and maybe it is not the best engaging database received in case we have to follow a Gmail warmup for it. Thus if you are not able to get the full database to work with then it could result in a failed warmup.
Another problem is that when a brand is switching ESPs, they generally provide the active data to new ESP as a requirement for sending from the new settings even if the domain is the same.
In case the marketer wishes to send the rest of the volumes via earlier ESP then they have just the inactive volumes left and thus it begins to affect the earlier domain and this imbalance can create a damage to their email program.
So what is a Brand Marketer looking for when switching ESPs?
- Flexibility in switching percentage of volumes from current email program without disrupting any business requirements.
- Having a balance in email program without affecting the warmup process for mailbox providers.
- Smoothly transition your emails from one platform to the other using the same or different domain.
- Provide access to entire database to new ESP for consideration on targeting base.
- Providing active database to new platform to work with without compromising your current email program.
So what is the solution to all of the above requirements?
Enter Pepiroute Connector!
What is Pepiroute?
Pepiroute is a connector application for enterprises which includes SaaS players like Marketing Automation Player, Email Marketing, Mobile Marketing, Personalization platforms and many more, to help manage the problem of managing multiple email delivery API vendors.
The connector will help these enterprises and vendors to route emails to different email API vendors like SendGrid and Netcore as per the rule configuration.
Why was Pepiroute connector built?
It helps SAAS players and Enterprises switch to a new Email vendor. Right from IP warm-ups to complete switch.
Basic Architecture:
Fig: Basic Pepiroute Connector architecture featuring several Providers.
Fig: Routing Engine of Pepiroute
Pepiroute Rules:
Pepiroute connector application will have an internal routing engine so as to make smart routing decisions on which data to route via options of Provider channels.
Thus there are certain rules an Enterprise can create in the Pepiroute connector application which will help you to effectively route the volumes as you wish.
Volume specific:
Administrators handling the application can route Email traffic based on volume of overall traffic.
They can assign a certain percentage figure on how much traffic needs to be routed on service provider 1 vs service provider 2.
Suppose the enterprise client wants to send 1000 emails in a day. So they will enter that 50% of the mails will go via ESP channel 1 ,v30% of the mails will go via ESP channel 2 & remaining 20% of the mails will go via ESP channel 3.
Engagement ratio
You can set a rule in the application based on engagement data , i.e. opens and clicks data that their users are showing with email campaigns.
Engagement will be based on open rate , click rate , Last mail opened in past number of days.
Based on high engagement or low / no engagement , you can decide to route your traffic via different service providers.
API type
Based on the type of API system API calls will be made – single and bulk.
The Enterprise administrator in this case will be able to choose the type of API and ESP channel to route it through.
ESP type:
You can decide based on the Mailbox Provider type through which you wish to route certain Email traffic. Eg: If you wish to route only Gmail based traffic via a certain service provider you can put in that role.
Header based
Header based routing in terms of Email Headers can also be done to route particular campaign traffic via a certain service provider.
Eg: Based on API – Tags, one can differentiate based on different headers and route the traffic.
Benefits of using Pepiroute Connector
We shall briefly run you through the advantages that Pepiroute Connector will offer for your current requirements.
- Easy and sophisticated ESP migration
With Pepiroute application, you will be spoilt for a choice in terms of making the ESP migration easier to do.
With the above Pepiroute rules, migrating particular traffic percentage wise or ISP wise will be a matter of a few minutes.
The GUI of Pepiroute is smooth and sophisticated which also comes with easy to understand display and features.
It will make your job an easy one of migrating to another ESP or making sure you route only traffic through that ESP.
- Hassle free IP/ domain warmup
Pepiroute will be able to route a desired part of your traffic via a service provider. The rest of the traffic can be routed via your earlier ESP in case you are between an ESP migration.
So, you can route only the active data i.e. engaged email ids via an ESP you are trying to follow a warmup and the rest of the inactive data can be routed via your current ESP in case of promotional campaigns.
This will ensure that you can follow a steady increase in volumes for new domain and ESP without affecting the domain hygiene.
– Boost your email deliverability
The above actions will lead to good inboxing and your Ips will also secure high reputation. You can use a select range of Ips for your warmup through one ESP and have them build reputation for you while the rest of your email program is running smoothly on both platforms.
Good inboxing will lead to a high reputation with mailbox providers and a superior email deliverability. It will lead to a much smoother warmup of Ips and a good scalability of volumes.
- Automatic engagement data retrieval from platforms
If the engaged data is available on the Global data present on Sendgrid platform, the Enterprise Administrator can select the particular conditions for selecting the data required for sending through the other ESP channel.
This will enable the client to select the type of email ids they would like to route through service provider channels. This would result in increased email deliverability through the platforms as the client will have total control on the data and will be able to make smart decisions based on data targeted for their promotional email campaigns.
This would apply to trigger type volumes as well, because the client can select certain campaigns they wish to route through different ESP channels and thus can carry out their volume migration in an effective manner.
– Low latency and scalability
Pepiroute connector has an ability to provide low-latency processing of incoming messages and scalability.
It has an enormous capability of handling a load of incoming 20 million emails.
The speed of operation is lightning quick and it is designed to be used for quick intelligent operations.
– Easy integration of Pepiroute Connector with ESPs :
The connector will enable the enterprise to directly integrate with the Enterprise platform to directly integrate in a simplified manner.
The Enterprise will connect the Pepiroute connector application via HTTP / SMTP APIs.
The HTTP/SMTP via which the Enterprise used to connect with the email service provider will be used and configured so that the Enterprise uses the same API key to connect with Input connector.
Wrapping up
We have introduced Pepipost first easy ESP switching application which helps you make smart decisions on routing your Email traffic between 2 or more providers.
It has an easy to understand GUI and offers uncomplicated operations.
It would help the client Enterprise to carry out a hassle-free migration of Email traffic between ESPs and help make smart decisions on the type of data to be routed via channels.
