Email Marketing FAQ

1. Why should I select Bamboo Cricket?
   The team at Bamboo Cricket has been in the email business since 1999. In 2006 we launched our Inbound Email Service as well as Live Chat and in 2011 Email Marketing was added to the mix. All three applications are focused around providing ‘Client Communications’ which are critical today. It isn’t just about blasting emails! It is about two-way ongoing communications with your prospects and customers. Bamboo Cricket provides the solution suite, team and ongoing assistance to allow you to create that ‘two-way communication’ with your customers.
2. How long does it take to setup my Email Account?
   Once you have completed your initial account setup a customer service representative will arrange a call to finalize your needs and activate your account.
3. Why do I need to talk to a Customer service representative?
   With many Email Service Providers focused on the small business market, they pool multiple clients together and email is sent from the pool. If one person in the pool has bad email addresses or is spamming then it can negatively impact the other companies using that pool. With Bamboo Cricket we have the ability to setup each client on their own dedicated IP addresses, so they are separate from anyone else. This allows you as a business to establish a strong mailing record and positively impact your ability to deliver email into all Internet Service Providers such as Hotmail, Yahoo, Gmail etc.
4. What is deliverability?
   One of the biggest challenges for email marketers is ensuring that their emails go into recipients’ inboxes rather than their junk mail folders. Bamboo Cricket subscribes to all the major whitelisting programs and have relationships with the major ISPs like Yahoo!, Hotmail, Netzero, AOL, and others to ensure the highest deliverability of your emails. Ultimately though, your deliverability is based on the quality of your data and employing best practices in the data collection and sending of email. See Email Best Practices for more information.
5. My account was blocked by my previous ESP. Can I send email through Bamboo Cricket?
   Your sender score (how you are rated on the quality of email you send) is like a credit score. The worse the score the less chance you will achieve deliverability into the various ISP’s. It is very important you follow best practices in building your data and in deploying email. Failing to do so will negatively impact your business. If you have any concerns, please talk to a customer service representative.
6. What is considered spam?
   Spam is defined as unsolicited mass email to persons with whom you do not have a business relationship and have not requested (opted-in to) your mailing. Bamboo Cricket is intended for marketers who have an established list of permission-based opt-in email addresses. We provide our product only to those who follow our strict Anti-Spam Policy. One may not send email to purchased lists using our system. Please read our Anti-Spam Policy.
7. How many users can I setup?
   You have the ability to setup multiple users with the administrative module. The users can be setup to deploy, load data, etc. based on what they need to do within the application.
8. How many lists can I setup?
   You may create an unlimited number of lists. In order to fully organize your contacts, you may need to create many separate lists, each containing subscribers. You can create a different list for each newsletter, for each interest group or for each demographic that you wish to reach.
9. Do you have HTML templates customers can use?
   Yes, we have a full library of HTML templates for your selection and are adding more every week. We make it very simple to use and edit the templates with our built-in HTML editor. We can also create a custom HTML template for a nominal fee.
10. Does Bamboo Cricket have bounce-back handling and how does it work?
    Yes, we have full bounce-back handling. Many times, a server or email address could go down for a few minutes, causing a message that normally goes through to bounce. If your service then removes that subscriber, you’ve lost a good prospect. To avoid this, we will only remove a subscriber from your list after five bounces have occurred. If you feel any email address was removed in error, you can add it back with one click. This system eliminates the false deletions that occur with many of our competitors’ bounce-back handling systems.
11. Does Bamboo Cricket provide an opt-out link?
    Every email sent through Bamboo Cricket contains a mandatory remove link at the bottom of the message. A subscriber may simply remove their email address permanently from a list by clicking the link and selecting the “unsubscribe” function. This remove link may not be disabled by any user. This means that every recipient of an email from the Bamboo Cricket system may easily and quickly opt to no longer receive emails from a list. Email addresses placed on your “remove list” may not be added to your list again.
12. What are the advantages of web-based software?
    Email list management software can either be web-based software such as Bamboo Cricket or desktop based software that you download and install on your computer. Since Bamboo Cricket is a web-based application that runs over the Internet, you can access it 24×7 from anywhere in the world where you can get online. With web-based software, all the sending and database management is done on the server side, meaning you will not have to spend time waiting for your larger campaigns to finish sending before you can use your computer again. With Bamboo Cricket, you choose “Deliver Immediately” or “Schedule Delivery” and you will be done within seconds. You can close your browser and move on to other work. Your campaign begins right away and will be fully sent in a matter of minutes. Another advantage of web-based software is that you can pay a low monthly charge instead of paying a much larger charge up-front for the software.
13. Are my email contacts secure?
    The records that you load into Bamboo Cricket and those entered by your customers from your website are yours, no if’s and’s or but’s. You maintain full ownership at all times. We have developed a highly secure, 128-bit encryption system housed in a secure data facility protected by multiple firewalls to prevent unauthorized access to the data. Furthermore, we will NEVER share, give, exchange, sell, rent out, use or copy your lists.
14. Can I use my company logo in my HTML mailings?
    Yes, you have full control over the look and contents of your emails. You may place your company logo and pictures of products, and any other images or graphics in your HTML emails. You can use our Email Editor to easily create your newsletter without any knowledge of HTML.
15. Does Bamboo Cricket provide tracking capability?
    Yes, we provide tracking capabilities such as unsubscribe and bounce management, click tracking, open tracking, web page activity tracking, and more.
16. How do we manage replies?
    Bamboo Cricket provides a robust reply management service that filters out real replies from customer responses, spam, bounces, out-of-office autoreplies, viruses, mailbox full messages, and more. You can fully configure how each of these types of incoming emails are processed. See Bamboo Cricket Inbound Email.
17. Can I add Live Chat to my emails?
    Yes. With the integrated suite of Bamboo Cricket communication products you can add a Live Chat icon that can be placed into any HTML message. In this way clients have an immediate way to contact you if they have any questions.
18. What support options are offered?
    Free phone and email support are offered 9AM-8PM EST Monday through Friday, excluding holidays. After hours emergency support is available through our emergency support team at support247@bamboocricket.com.
19. Am I locked into a contract?
    No. There are no long-term contracts with our monthly plans.
20. Are there any setup fees?
    There is a one-time setup fee equivalent to one months service. This includes the setup of your own custom domain and the whitelisting application process with the major ISP’s.
21. What types of payment do you accept?
    We accept payment with Visa, Mastercard, American Express, and Paypal. Payments are processed through our payment system online only. For security reasons we cannot accept payments by phone.