How to create and send a campaign

A campaign is one email you write once and send to a group of people. Open Messaging > Campaigns and click New campaign. The wizard has four steps, and nothing is sent until you confirm on the last one.

Before you start, make sure you have subscribed contacts, a Business address in Settings > General (it is printed in every email footer) and a working sending method in Settings > Sending. See Is my site ready to send email?.

Step 1: Setup #

1. Type a Campaign name. Only you see it.
2. Type the Subject line. Merge tags work here, for example {{first_name|there}}. See merge tags.
3. Optional: add Preview text (the grey line some inboxes show after the subject) and change the Sender (From name, From email, Reply-to email). Empty fields use the defaults from Settings > General. Link tracking has Tag links for Google Analytics (UTM).
4. Optional: tick Test a second subject line (A/B). See A/B subject line tests.
5. Click Continue to audience.

Step 2: Audience #

Choose Everyone who is subscribed, or pick lists, tags and segments and leave some people out. The card Who gets it right now shows the count. Details: Choose who gets a campaign.

Step 3: Content #

1. Pick an editor: Visual builder, Classic editor, Plain text or HTML code. Not sure? Read Choose an email editor.
2. Start from a starter design, one of your own templates, or an empty email. The campaign gets its own copy, so your templates stay unchanged.
3. Click Open the editor, write the email and click Done. It saves as you type.
4. Click Send a test and check the email on your phone. Tests are never tracked.
5. Click Continue to review. If the campaign already has an email, this step shows it with Edit the email, Preview, Send a test, Save as template and Start over.

Step 4: Review and send #

1. Check the card What goes out. Change on a row takes you back to that step.
2. Work through Before it goes out. Orange items are advice. Red items block sending until you fix them: a missing subject, From address, content, audience, or business address.
3. Under When, choose Send now or Schedule for later (the time is in your site's timezone).
4. Click Send now to N or Schedule, then confirm.

Hive Mail sends at the speed set in Settings > Sending and checks each person just before their email leaves, so someone who unsubscribes meanwhile is skipped. Each person gets the campaign once.

Warning: You cannot recall an email that has already been sent. Pause and Cancel only stop what has not gone out yet.

Next: Schedule, pause, resume, cancel and duplicate a campaign and How to read a campaign report. If nothing goes out, see Emails are not sending.