Email Channels
Overview
The Email Channels module allows a Workspace Administrator to add and manage email accounts to be used for incoming and outgoing email communications.
Open the Workspace.
Hover over the Channels menu.
Select Email. The first page of a list of email channel records is displayed.
What are Email Channels?
Email Channels are the mechanism by which incoming emails are retrieved from mailboxes and routed to an appropriate email campaign for processing by agents. The protocol used to retrieve emails is POP3 (Post Office Protocol 3) and the protocol used to send emails is SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol). IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol) is not used.
Routing emails to campaigns
The rules for assigning an incoming email to a particular campaign are specified in the channel definition and can be quite flexible. It is a relatively simple matter to configure the system to route emails from several mailboxes to the same campaign, or emails from one mailbox to several different campaigns. And, indeed, combinations of these two models are also possible.
For example, one might route all emails (from several mailboxes) with the word "Sales" in the subject line, to one campaign - "All Sales". But, emails from a "Product A" mailbox with the word "Support" in the Subject line could be routed to a specific "Product A Support" campaign, while emails from a "Product B" mailbox with the word "Support" in the Subject line could be routed to a specific "Product B Support" campaign.
It is expected that any mailbox used by a POP3 email channel will be dedicated to this purpose. Do not assign a mailbox that is also used for other purposes as the Contact Centre will retrieve all incoming emails and delete them from the mailbox.
Some cloud-based email servers, such as Gmail, may retain copies of all emails (including Sent emails) in the Inbox and manage their status using labels. The Contact Centre will retrieve any emails in the Inbox that have been sent to that address but will not fetch emails addressed to any other address. In this case, it becomes the responsibility of the Mailbox Administrator to empty the mailbox of unfetched emails regularly. The Contact Centre will discontinue interaction with a mailbox that it detects to have more than 20 emails that it should not fetch.
What are Email Filters?
Email filters can be used to create incoming email routing strategies within an Email Channel. Keywords can be associated with the following email fields:
Sender
Subject
Body
For example, one email filter might route incoming emails which contain the keyword "Sales" within the body of the email, to the email campaign called "All Sales".
But, a second filter for this email channel might route incoming emails which contain the keyword "Support" within the subject of the email to the email campaign called "Customer Support".
You can create as many filters as you want for a single email channel. You can also prioritise filters over others.
1. Add or Edit an Email Channel
This feature allows you to create a new or update an existing email channel.
Open the Workspace
Select Email from the Channels menu:
To create a new email channel, click the Add icon in the display header
To update an existing email channel, locate the channel in the display and click the Edit icon to the right of the record
We recommend you do not assign an email address that is also used for other purposes (i.e. personal email address) as the Cloud Contact Centre Solution will retrieve all incoming emails and delete them from the mailbox.
This dialog allows you to manually enter all the required technical details of an Email Channel.
Apart from identification and basic campaign information, these details are mostly concerned with defining the means of connecting to a POP3 server (to retrieve email) and an SMTP server (to send email).
To assist you to provide valid configuration information, the dialogs also provide you with some powerful tools to check the validity of the details you enter.
Field | What you should do |
|---|---|
Channel name | Enter, or modify, the name of the Email Channel. |
Default Campaign | Select the Default Email Campaign to which emails retrieved by this channel are delivered. This campaign is only the default - if filters are defined, their campaign selections override this setting whenever matching emails are retrieved. Nevertheless, a default campaign must be defined before an Email Channel can be activated, otherwise the system would not know what to do with retrieved emails that didn't match any of the channel's defined filters. |
Channel activation | Click the Checkbox to activate the channel and cause it to retrieve emails on a regular basis. |
The Channel Activation checkbox can only be checked if a default email campaign is defined. You have to create an Email Campaign in order to be able to activate an email channel.
POP3 Server Settings
POP3 (Post Office Protocol 3) is the most recent version of a standard protocol for receiving e-mail.
Field Name | What you should do |
|---|---|
Email address | Enter the Email Address of the mailbox from which emails for this channel will be retrieved. |
User account name | Enter or modify the Name of the email account for this email address. Typically, this is the portion in front of the @ symbol. |
Account password | Enter the password needed to access this mailbox. |
POP3 server name | Enter or modify the name of the POP3 server that hosts this mailbox. This can be obtained from your Email Service Provider or your IT department. |
Use SSL | Click on the check box to enable Secure Sockets Layer (SSL). SSL is a cryptographic protocol designed to provide communication security over the Internet. |
POP3 server port | The standard server port for retrieving emails using the POP3 protocol is 110 if you use insecure access, and 995 if you use secure access, using SSL. |
Poll interval | The period, in minutes, between successive attempts to retrieve emails using this Email Channel. |
Note
By default, some cloud-based email providers do not allow POP download and they retain copies of all emails in the Inbox (e.g. Google). You need to ensure that your mailbox is configured in a way that:
POP is enabled
The "delete Mail's copy when messages are accessed with POP" option has been activated.
These two options are usually part of the settings section of your cloud-based email provider.
SMTP Server Settings
SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) is a TCP/IP protocol used in sending and receiving e-mail.
Field Name | What you should do |
Email address | Enter the Email Address of the mailbox from which emails for this channel will be sent. |
User account name | Enter or modify the Name of the email account for this email address. Typically, this is the portion in front of the @ symbol. |
Account password | Enter the Password needed to access this mailbox. Typically, this field will have already been auto-filled with the details entered above for the POP3 password, as these will generally (but not always) be the same. |
SMTP server name | Enter or modify the Name of the SMTP server through which you will be sending emails when using this Email Channel. This can be obtained from your Email Service Provider or your IT department. |
Security Protocol | Choose between Transport Level Security (TLS) or Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protocols to be used when sending emails to this SMTP server2. |
SMTP Server port | The standard Server Port for sending emails using the SMTP protocol is 25 if you use insecure access, and 465 if you use secure access, using SSL. |
At the bottom of each Server section of the dialog is a Validate button.
Click Validate to initiate a search over the Internet for the relevant server (POP3 or SMTP). This process attempts to contact the server and check whether the email account is valid. The entire process can take quite a long time - up to 1 minute - depending on the configuration of the mail server(s) involved.
Validating a server configuration is recommended, but not mandatory. Whatever server settings are input can be saved, and the system will attempt to use them.
For more information about Cloud Email service providers and configuration, please visit ARCLAB.
2. Display Email Channels
This feature allows you to navigate the list of email channels created in the contact centre.
From this list, you can add, edit or delete email channels. You can also add or edit email filters.
A list of channels is displayed with the following details:
Column | Contents |
|---|---|
 | Click the Selection Checkbox to select/deselect the Email Channel. |
Channel Name | On the top line, the name that has been assigned to this Email Channel is displayed. On the second line, if there are any filters defined for this Email Channel, a Display Filters icon is shown, along with information on how many filters records have been defined. |
 | One or two indicators indicating whether the Email Channel is operating correctly or not. |
Email Address | The Email Address of the mailbox from which emails for this channel are retrieved. |
Default Campaign | The Campaign to which emails retrieved through this channel will be assigned if no filters are defined, or if an email doesn't match any of the filters. |
Status | Indication of whether or not this Email Channel is currently Active. |
Action Icons | Action icons appear if the mouse is hovered over an email channel record. |
| Activate Channel. |
 | Click the Edit Channel icon to open the Edit Email Channel dialog. |
 | Click the Add Filter icon to open the Add a Filter dialog. |
Quick Search
If you know the Channel Name, enter it, or a part of it, into the Quick Search field and click the Search icon to locate the channel with that ID.
Search Options
This advanced search feature allows you to reduce the list of email channels displayed by adding one or more search criteria.
Click Search Options to open the advanced search options
Enter your search criteria
Click Search
The search criteria include:
Search Parameter | What you should do |
|---|---|
Default Campaign | Select the default Campaign of interest. The search lists all Email Channels which use this Campaign as their default, but does not list Email Channels which route emails to this Campaign through the use of filters. |
Channel name | Enter the name of the Email Channel of interest. Note. In Quick Search, you can enter a part of a channel name, e.g. enter 'call' or 'action' to return 'call to action'. |
Status | Select one of All, Active, or Inactive. |
Email address | Enter the Email Address of the mailbox of the Email Channel of interest. |
3. Add or Edit an Email Filter
This feature is used to route incoming emails that contain specific keywords to a specific email campaign.
Open the Workspace.
Select Email from the Channels menu.
To create a new email filter, hover over the channel in the display and click the Add a Filter icon to the right of the email channel record
To update an existing email filter, click the Show Filters icon located under the name of the email channel then click the Edit icon to the right of the relevant filter record
This dialog allows you to define an email filter for a specific Email Channel.
Field | What you should do |
|---|---|
Channel Name | Displays the Name of the Email Channel. |
Filter Name | Enter or modify the Name of this filter. |
Description | Enter or modify the Description of the filter. This is useful for capturing the intent of the filter, or summarising the rules built into it - such as "All emails with 'Sales' in the subject line". |
Campaign | Select the Email Campaign to which emails that match this filter are delivered. |
Filter Rules
Field | What you should do |
Sender filter rules | Enter the text string to be compared against the contents of the Sender field in incoming emails. The comparison is case-independent and partial. For example, a string of 'Company' would match both 'company.com' and 'company.net'. |
Subject filter rules | Enter a single word (no punctuation or trailing spaces) that will be compared to the contents of the Subject field in incoming emails. The comparison is case-independent and partial and you can have as many rules as you need. |
Body filter rules | Enter single word (no punctuation or trailing spaces) that will be compared to the contents of the Body in incoming emails. The comparison is case-independent and partial and you can have as many rules as you need. |
Filter Activation | Click the Checkbox to activate the Filter |
Individual filters act independently of each other. So, if one of the three filters (Sender, Subject, or Body) matches the relevant field in the incoming email, then the Filter will be deemed to have matched, and the email will be passed to the selected Email Campaign
4. Display Email Filters
This feature allows you to access a list of filters for a specific email channel. It also allows you to activate or deactivate a filter. You can drag and drop filters to organise priorities over each other.
Where to find this feature
Open the Workspace.
Select Email from the Channels menu.
Click the Show/Hide Filter icon beside the name of the email channel you would like to configure.
The Filters List shows the defined filters in the selected Email Channel and, for each, displays the following details:
Column | Contents |
|---|---|
Filter Priority | The numerical Priority of the filter, with 1 being the highest priority. |
Filter Name | The Name of this filter. |
Description | A Description of the filter. This is useful for capturing the intent of the filter, or summarising the rules built into it - such as "All emails with 'Sales' in the subject line". |
Campaign | The Campaign to which emails that match this filter will be assigned. |
Active | Indication of whether or not this filter is currently Active. |
To create a new email filter, locate the channel in the display and click the Add a Filter icon to the right of the email channel record.
To update an existing email filter, click the Edit icon to the right of the relevant filter record.