Campaign Enterprise Version 12

By: Chris Lewis

After years of development and a complete re-write, Campaign Enterprise version is close to completion.  We have had many inquires about what will be included in the new release.  It might be good first to show how the software has developed over time.

Back in the early 90's, Arial Software was created just about when the internet was gaining steam.  The first product we created was a desktop emailing system.  It was basically a glorified Microsoft Outlook, had some merging capabilities, but nothing like SPAM or unsubscribes existed back then.  As the internet changed and SPAMing became a reality, the software change to accommodate this.  Then Campaign Enterprise was created which was the first web-based product we had with a built in webserver.  This webserver was pretty simple but there was no configuration required and back then IIS was very difficult to configure and not get hacked.  Campaign Enterprise continued to accommodate for new SPAM rules, new online editors, new operating systems, and new databases.  During this time the same code has been used and features like multi-threading, SSL security, and other webserver system were added.  The things we created ourselves were now becoming available in the .NET programming world and though our systems were stable, it was time to move the system to a new language and platform.

For the past year we have been rewriting Campaign Enterprise from the ground-up.  Campaign Enterprise is now completely written in the .NET framework, supports true multi-threading managed by the OS, and the platform for the webserver is now IIS (Microsoft's Internet Information Service).  Campaign Enterprise now works as two separate systems working in harmony.  The webserver aspect of the product, used for campaign administration, conversion event resolution, views-as-webspage function, and unsubscribe functions is now all IIS driven.  Now, you will have control over all aspects of how the products works, like security, SSL certificates for HTTPS functions, NTML user authentication, and everything else IIS offers.

Also, the back-end database for Campaign Enterprise will now be based on Microsoft's SQL server.  Campaign Enterprise will include a version of SQL server or you can use your own existing SQL server by creating the appropriate database volume.

There is much more to come, but below is a short-list of the new capabilities of Campaign Enterprise version 12:

• The system completely rewritten in a modern language (.net) that supports today's OSs and multi-threading
• The web server portion works in Windows IIS which offers a ton of flexibly.
• Email sending speeds have been dramatically increased
• The user interface is more intuitive to sending email
• You can send from multiple lists at the same time
• There is a built-in POP server so all bounce handing is done internally and you don't have to establish bounce POP accounts for each campaign as before
• You can create "Client" areas, each with their own users and campaigns separate from all other Clients (different clients, departments, etc.)
• You can create and maintain built-in Email Lists with importing capabilities
• The backend database is MS SQL Server. You can use the free version of MS SQL or use an instance of your own SQL server
• Email sending is done using multiple sending threads instead of a singular sending thread
• Since we are using IIS for the web server all SSL certificates for communicating in HTTPS are support
• Windows user login ability (NTLM) allows you to choose to use your Windows login context to log into Campaign Enterprise
• View email as a webpage capability
• Graphics that are referenced in the email you send can be upload through the interface and used by the emails when they are viewed
• Higher performance conversion tracking due to the IIS server and MS SQL server
• More reporting capabilities with the combination of MS SQL server table and better recording structure
• Able to submit campaign initiation from outside of Campaign Enterprise (API)