Experiences with newsletter scripts

When is it worth outsourcing to a service?

[mincklerstraat]

Many clients ask for the ability to send newsletters - many more than I think are really likely to actually work hard enough to get enough subscribers to their newslist. However, some already have quite active newslists and when they want to use my services, of course they want to continue sending out the newsletters.

E-mail is particularly challenging these days with all the spam and counter-spam measures. When I set up a newsletter, I do so with php-list, and I'm a bit surprised at all the config extras here - like doing cron jobs to check the mailserver for bounces, in order to remove mail addresses that are no longer active.

So my question is: as a php web person, when is it possible to go wrong with php list scripts you host and maintain yourselves? Are there scripts you recommend more than others here? Do you charge extra for possible future maintenance? Are there things here to watch out for?

I'm asking you fellow php-ers since this question also has to do with the particularities of php in sending out masses of e-mail - e.g., whether you select options for sending out batches of x mails every x seconds.

Thanks for your thoughts here!

[jatar_k]

I have always done large batches in chunks using cron
I always use double opt in

I mostly tell people to get someone who specializes in newsletters to manage it for them, it really is a hassle