Bounced e-mail, also referred to as bounce back, is an e-mail that is returned to sender because it failed to be delivered.
It comes as a note in your inbox that the message cannot be delivered due to some reasons.
Bulk Mailer classifies the following types of bounced back emails: hard bounce, soft bounce, auto-reply, temporary bounced, blocked, and unknown.
- Hard bounce - The mailing client cannot successfully transmit the message, because the email address is invalid or not-existing or the mailbox is unavailable. This error cannot be resolved by simply resending the email. There should be made some changes in the recipients email address.
- Soft bounce - The mailing server cannot temporarily accept the message. The most likely reasons are the following: the recipient's inbox is full. This error can be resolved repeated sending.
- Auto Reply - The auto-reply to your message, a sort of confirmation email.
- Blocked - If the recipient's server blocks the emails sent from your mail server's IP or from your IP address because it is blacklisted. Another probable reason is the message content has triggered the spam filter. In this case it is reasonable to bring about changes into the message content and to check spam rate using our free online tool.
- Temporary - The mail server is temporarily unable to send your message. This usually happens if the mailbox is temporarily disabled or not found.
- Unknown - The mailing program cannot detect the kind of the bounce message.
Bulk Mailer features a built-in Bounced Manager module which is essential for processing bounced messages after the sending is completed.
The Bounced Manager retrieves the e-mail addresses from bounced back messages and then sorts them according to the following categories: Hard bounce, Soft bounce, AntiSpam, AutoReply etc.
Note: Bounce Manager retrieves the messages from configured POP3 account. If the message is Hard bounced, Bulk Mailer will automatically delete it from your mailing server.
How to retrieve bounced messages using the Bounced Manager tool:
- First you have to create Pop3 account in order to retrieve bounced emails.
Click the Add button and fill in the settings.
(Take a look at more detailed instructions on creating Pop3 account - "Article about creating Pop3 account") - Press the Process button to start up retrieving bounced emails from the server. All bounced messages will appear in the middle pane.
As soon as the process of retrieving is completed, you can either unsubscribe bounced email addresses or delete them from your contact list in Bulk Mailer. Also you can export bounced email addresses to a text file or add them to a new list in the program.
To perform an action on any type of bounced email addresses:
- Click Wizard button on the toolbar of the middle pane.
- In the new dialog window select an action, what you want to do with your bounced emails.
- At the next step, select the type of bounced email - hard, soft, or other.
Corresponding action will be performed.
To manage the rules that Bounce Manager uses to recognize bounce messages, press the Settings button on the form.
To see more detailed instructions, take a look at our tutorial "Bounce Manager Settings".