After your application has been approved and your account has been set up, you can follow the steps below to configure your CiviSMTP Account.

Step 1. Domain for your mailings. 

Step 2.  Configure your CiviCRM

Step 2.1  Set up a Drupal/Joomla/WordPress user for processing SOAP requests.

Step 2.2 Configure Domain Information

Step 2.3 Configure Outbound Email Settings

Step 3.  Configure your CiviSMTP Account

Step 4. How to test that it all works

Troubleshooting

Step 1. Domain for your mailings.

Once your account was activated we sent you an email that contains a domain name that you will use for your mailings.
It looks something like:

yourorgname.civismtp.com OR yourorgname.uas.coop

If you would like to use your own domain instead of the domain we gave you then follow these steps to set it up. 

Please note that whether you use our domain or your own it may take up to 72 hrs for the domain's MX records to fully propagate through DNS before you can send mailings.

Step 2.  Configure your CiviCRM

Step 2.1  Set up a CMS (Drupal/Joomla/WordPress) user for processing SOAP requests.

 

This is the user with which our system communicates about bounces, subscribes, unsubscribes, replies, etc. 

You can give it any username and password, for example soap_user, soap_user_password.

In Drupal this user has to have the following permissions for the CiviCRM module:

• access CiviCRM 
• edit all contacts 
• edit groups 

In WordPress you can set the user Role to "None".
In Joomla under 'Assigned User Groups' select 'Registered User'.

NOTE: Please ensure that this CMS user is linked to a CiviCRM contact.

NOTE: In Joomla 1.7.x to ensure that your SOAP CMS user is linked to a CiviCRM contact please follow these steps:

1. Create a CiviCRM contact

2. Create a Joomla user with same name and email

3. Logout and login as that newly created user

4. Go to CiviCRM and view the contact record, you should see a linked user record.

In Joomla 2.5.x and higher please follow these steps to create a CiviCRM contact with a linked user record:

1. Create a new CiviCRM contact. Use any first and last name such as "SOAP USER". Use any working email address.

2. Go to the View page for that contact. At the top in the Actions dropdown select "Create User Record" option.

3. Fill in username and password and take note of those - you will need to enter them later for the CiviSMTP Account Settings. Add this user record.

 

Step 2.2 Configure Domain Information

 

Go to “Administer CiviCRM” -> Configure -> “Domain Information”

(In CCRM 4.1+ go to “Administer CiviCRM” -> “Communications”  -> “Organization Address and Contact Info” instead)

Configure the following:

•  Domain Name - The name of the organization or entity which owns this CiviCRM site or domain.. this is used internally by CiviCRM to identify separate domains within a single installation

•  Description - Optional description of this domain

•  FROM Name and Email - The FROM Name and Email Address are used when automated emails are sent from this domain (e.g. subscribe and unsubscribe confirmations...). This Name and Email Address are also used as the default 'sender' values when you create a new CiviMail Mailing.

•  In CCRM versions prior to 2.2 Configure Email Domain - This is the same domain as in Step 1, for example yourorgname.civismtp.com (or your custom domain if you set it up)
Save the Domain Information settings and continue to Step 2.3

•  In CiviCRM 2.2+

1. Save the Domain Information settings

2. Go to "Administer CiviCRM" -> CiviMail -> Mail Accounts

3. Edit the default account and set ONLY the following values only:

•  Name - whatever name you wish to give to this account, you can leave it as default.

•  Email Domain - The domain from Step 1, for example yourorgname.civismtp.com (or your custom domain if you set it up)

•  Protocol - choose any value

•  If you see a setting for Default Option? - yes - select the checkbox and click "Save"

•  If you see a setting for "Used For?" then set it to "Bounce Processing"

Make sure no other fields are set.

Step 2.3 Configure Outbound Email Settings

In CCRM 2 and earlier go to Administer CiviCRM -> Global Settings -> Outbound Email (SMTP)

In CCRM 2.1+ go to Administer CiviCRM -> Global Settings -> Outbound Email (SMTP/SendMail)

In CCRM 4.1+ go to Administer CiviCRM -> System Settings -> Outbound Email

Configure the following settings:

•  In CiviCRM 2.1+ select "SMTP" in the "Select Mailer" options

•  SMTP Server - civismtp.uas.coop

•  SMTP Port - use 20095

•  Authentication? - choose yes

•  SMTP username - pick any unique username

•  SMTP password - pick any unique password

NOTE: if you do not see "SMTP Password" field on the Outbound Email (SMTP) Settings page then you have to set this value in the civicrm.settings.php file. If you do see the "SMTP Password" on the Outbound Email (SMTP) Settings page still check the civicrm.settings.php file and if the password setting is there then set it.

Save Settings. 

NOTE: Do not send a test mailing at this step as the test will fail!

 

Step 3.  Configure your CiviSMTP Account

Fill out your CiviSMTP Account settings here if you have a current CiviSMTP account:

https://www.civismtp.com/drupal/civismtp/account

Each field in the form is described below:

  • Name for this smtp domain account: - This is a display name for your account. 

    The name that you provide in this field will be used only for display in the "Choose the account that you would like to modify:" drop-down on this form and is useful only if you have multiple sub-accounts under one CiviSMTP login.

  • User Name for SMTP Authorization - same as SMTP username you chose in Step 2.3

  • Password for SMTP Authorization -  same as SMTP password you chose in Step 2.3

  • Username of the Civimail Soap User - username for the user you configured in Step 2.1

  • Password for the CiviMail Soap User - password for the user you configured in Step 2.1

  • CiviMail SOAP Proxy - URL for the CiviCRM Soap proxy script. 

    The CiviCRM Soap script comes with CiviCRM installation and can be accessed via the web after you have successfully installed and activated CiviCRM and CiviMail. This is the URL that we will be contacting about bounces, unsubscribes, replies, and etc. 

    Typically, the URL is of the following form but it can be different depending on your installation and version:

    Drupal - http://<your_site_installation_root>/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/soap.php

    Joomla - http://<your_site_installation_root>/administrator/components/com_civicrm/civicrm/extern/soap.php

    WordPress - http://<your_site_installation_root>/wp-content/plugins/civicrm/civicrm/extern/soap.php

    IMPORTANT: Make sure you can access this URL and get a 200 HTTP response as this is how we tell your CiviMail about the bounces, unsubscribes, replies, and etc.

  • The email domain. - same as in Step 1, for example yourorgname.civismtp.com (or your custom domain if you set it up)

  • IP Address of the machine from which you will be sending email - This is normally the ip address of the machine where your CiviCRM installation is located. We need this because we will be checking ip addresses of all senders when email is going through our system

Check the “Test Settings” option and hit Save. 

If there are any issues with the CiviSMTP Settings you just entered you will get an error with details on which field is invalid. If you get an error recheck that setting and retest.

If you receive an error message SMTP Account Settings save operation failed, please choose a different SMTP Username in Step 2.3

Step 4. How to test that it all works

Step 4.1 Outbound Email Settings Test

Go back to the Outbound Email Settings page from Step 2.3 and click on “Save & Send Test Email”

You should receive a test email to your default CiviCRM email.

 

Step 4.2 Send a test CiviMail mailing

 

•  Create a test group in CiviCRM and add some test contacts to it. Make sure you can access these test email accounts to ensure that your mailing was delivered.It is a good idea to also create a “bad” contact with nonexistent email address and add it to this group to test bounces.

•  Create a new mailing in CiviMail and select the test group you just created as recipient group.

•  On Step 2 of the mailing setup under “Responding” check the options for “Track Replies?” and “Forward Replies”

•  Go through the rest of the Mailing setup and set it to send immediately. You can send a test mailing on Step 4 if you wish.

•  Send the mailing by either setting up a Scheduled Job or loading the “civimail queue” url:

In Drupal something like:

<path_to_drupal>/civicrm/mailing/queue?reset=1

In Joomla something like: 

<path_to_joomla>administrator/?option=com_civicrm&task=civicrm/mailing/queue&reset=1

In WordPress something like: 

<path_to_wordpress>wp-admin/admin.php?page=CiviCRM&q=civicrm/mailing/queue&reset=1

Make sure your mailing is now marked as Completed on CiviMail “Scheduled and Sent Mailings” page

•  Go to the “Scheduled and Sent Mailings”  in CiviMail and click on the “Report” link next to your mailing. Check that the number of successful deliveries and bounces makes sense.

•  Access your test email accounts and make sure you received the test mailing. 

•  From one of the test email accounts make sure you can reply and unsubscribe by email. Go back to the CiviMail report for your mailing and make sure the reply and unsubscribe was tracked properly.

 

Troubleshooting

  • If there are any issues with the CiviSMTP Settings you entered you will get an error with details on which field is invalid. If you get an error recheck that the corresponding setting is entered correctly and then retest the settings.
  • Below are some of the common errors and ways to debug them:
  • • "It appears that the proxy URL that you gave is invalid" - this means there is a problem with your SOAP proxy - either the SOAP proxy URL is not reachable, returns 500 or 404 error or returns some other invalid response such as a CiviCRM error. In this case you need to resolve the error and retest/resave the settings.
  • To help debug SOAP proxy errors you can use the Perl script check_soap_settings.pl.txt (or its PHP version check_soap.php.txt). This script triggers an authentication call against the SOAP proxy url and will print you the response.
  • To use the script:
  • - rename the script to check_soap_settings.pl (or check_soap.php if using the PHP version) and upload to a directory on your server
  • - 'cd' into the directory that contains the uploaded script and execute it with the following parameters:
  • perl check_soap_settings.pl <soap_user> <soap_password> <full_proxy_url>
  • For PHP script: 
  • php check_soap.php <soap_user> <soap_password> <full_proxy_url>
  • This will print the response from the SOAP proxy URL. If you see "1-successfully authenticated" then your SOAP proxy is working. If you get any other response then check the response for error details.
  • • SMTP Account Settings save operation failed - please choose a different SMTP Username in Step 2.3 and resave and retest the settings.
AttachmentSize
check_soap_settings.pl.txt639 bytes
check_soap.php.txt649 bytes