It was another week of broken systems. Last Monday, Aweber, a trusted autoresponder service, was targeted by a Denial-of-Service attack. That means some hacker made it so Aweber customers – or their subscribers – couldn’t access Aweber services.
You may have noticed that links weren’t working in your email messages from people you subscribe to. Well, that was because the links were tracked by Aweber and when the service provider was attacked, it shut down all services. So those links would not resolve.
Some of you emailed to tell me my links were broken. And thank you for that. It’s nice to know you are looking out for me!
And this attack on Aweber went on ALL WEEK LONG!
This event points out that you have to look for your weakest links in your business.
Yes, Aweber has a hoard of security specialists resolving the problem. But what I’m talking about is your own business. When your online business depends on a service for critical aspects, like sending emails to subscribers, you should consider the consequences of what to do when it becomes unavailable.
In technology lingo it’s referred to as “redundant services” and “high availability.”
I'm just tossing this out because if you start depending on your online business to pay bills, feed the kids and pay employees what is your plan for protecting it from broken systems. This is just something for you to reflect on in your business.
So far this year I’ve had hosting fail during one of my major releases and all last week it was impossible to do anything involving subscriber lists.
Am I dumping Aweber? Heck no. Not yet. I figure once they fix this broken leg it will be much stronger. The other service providers need to be on high alert for their own weaknesses.
Of course that leaves me with only a single Autoresponder service. Can you think of alternative or any workarounds? I’d love to hear your thoughts. Please share them with a comment below.
And thank you for doing so!
Mark says
This is a timely post because I have been working on alternatives today — all day. I am testing a WordPress plugin called Javelin. It is an autoresponder system build into WP. Unfortunately, such autoresponders are not reliable nor are they scalable. But on an alternate thought, it could be a backup to “capture” subscribers then export the log and import into aweber.
I agree that you are only as strong as your weakest link. So a contingency plan in place is needed. I don’t know much about product launches but how much effort is it to push one back?
Kater says
Hi Mark!
I thought you might have some technical insight. If you end up writing a review on that plugin let me know and I’ll share with the group. I was thinking something like that too. Or maybe do an export from Aweber into a database and import into something like that plug in. Don’t know if it allows that. Thanks for your share!
Mark says
It’s a good possibility but there’s always the risk of someone unsubscribing AFTER you backed up but before you transferred. Hopefully that won’t happen…
What are your thoughts on that?
Kater says
Ahh, well, no one unsubscribes from my list! :>
But to your point, the idea is that it is a backup, so I think the issue is that a few people may be upset that I sent them an email from my personal list. I suppose that is really a gray area and if someone wanted they could complain because they have nothing better to do. I think I would put a note in the message stating something like:
NOTE: Today, my AR service is unavailable. This is a update from my personal email. I’m sending it to you in this manner because you are subscribed to PLRPump.com. I added your email address to my contacts from a backup of my autoresponder list (before it went offline). If you are unhappy with this, please reply to me and I’ll unsubscribe you immediately from these temporary mailings and from my official list – whenever that service becomes available. I will resume the normal communication channel when it returns to service. Thanks for your understanding.
I think that covers me from the perspective of using email addresses in an ethical manner. However, I could also take the low-road and not send out any emails.
Susan O'Dea says
Hi Kater,
This is also timely for me and I have been wondering the same thing as you…what to do as a backup plan.
I signed up with another autoresponder service before this even happened. I now have 2 AR’s. (Aweber and now GetResponse). Today I am going to be playing with GetResponse. My reasoning wasn’t because of the hacking dilemma (I am playing with api’s in amember) and want to try both.
It may sound costly to some, but if some of my subscribers are spread out across the two…when one is down…I won’t be as worried. Plus maybe I can import my subscribers and use one as a ‘backup server’ anyway.
As always, time will tell!
Kater says
Hi Susan,
I haven’t gone the path of a 2nd AR service. In fact, I just read that Getresponse had an outage too last week! So, I’m thinking something like Mark suggested in an earlier comment. Like an internal system driven off your WP site or from a website anyway. I know one thing for sure. I’m going to export my subscriber database more frequently!
When you said you had problems with Aweber’s APIs that makes me think you are doing some software integration? If so, that’s way above my technical expertise, but I’m always open to questions. Feel free to ask here or at via the support desk at sosg.zendesk.com. Thanks so much for chiming in.
Susan O'Dea says
aMember has its own internal email system…but I am keen to try both. The only problem I have with amember’s api is that with aweber you need to have the double optin set and your clients get 2 confirmation emails…1 from aweber and 1 from amember…with getresponse I have been told you don’t have that issue.
If it works…I will be ecstatic! One reson being people won’t be bombarded by double optins everywhere and secondly, I will have 3 autoresponder systems working just how I want. A win-win I think…but I have to set it up before I can celebrate. 🙂
That is what I will do now if I can login to at least one of my autoresponder services…haha…I never worry too much about ‘downtime’ it is inevitable working online…but I like a backup plan when it does!
Kater says
I don’t have double optin on several of my Aweber lists.Just turn it off in list settings. It is a “recommended practice” touted by Aweber(and others), but not required.
Robin Lee says
Well this is what I think .. sh** happens all the time and in many areas of life.
Cars break down, faucets leak, power lines go down, etc .. and life goes on.
The fact that we as internet marketers depend upon our tools and services to
run our businesses does not negate real life occurrences.
Aweber will figure it out and will be stronger in the long run. So will GetResponse.
The Warrior Forum, JVZoo, HostGator, etc, experience hacks and glitches and
everyone bitches and complains .. and then life and business goes on.
Ride it out, make adjustments and improvements and carry on.
No single tool or system is perfect or infallible. Maybe that’s the Universe’s way
of getting us to take a day off 😉
Kater says
Hi Robin,
That is true. Stuff happens. But there’s a difference when it happens and you depend on the income driven by these internal resources. If Aweber crapped out for a week when I was still drawing a paycheck from my employer, no problem. But things have changed and now what happens directly impacts if I get paid this month. I think the way is to build in some redundancy. I think the Universe was telling me to think bigger. :>
Justin Popovic says
Good topic Kate.
I also use Aweber but luckily the outage didn’t really impact my business that much. But to answer your question, I do have some work arounds in place if needed. For example, all of my customers are also tracked in my own database through either DAP or DLGuard so I have their contact information. I could fairly easily extract their email addresses and import them into a new AR service or even bulk email them through my own mail server. I would want to be careful with this approach obviously but at the end of the day I’m confident I could handle this problem. I think most people would find a way to make it work if you were forced to! Definitely a good thing to think about though…great post
Kater says
Hi Justin,
Oh, yes! You do have that membership system for tracking. Great point. I also thought about the sales listings in JVzoo as an emergency fallback. Collect the names there and import into a temporary email list or another AR service. Thanks for chiming in!
Fern C says
Hi Kate,
Thanks for the post. Dealing with a weak system is indeed a very important consideration.
I would have replied earlier if not for my own little mini-crisis. It was silly of me to have accidentally installed some malicious popup / ad malware, and unwanted ads hijacked many legitimate links in Firefox. It was so annoying and impossible to work.
Thanks to Google search and the Firefox support forum, I was able to resolve (hopefully!) the problem with 2 anti-malware / spyware tools.
Yes, unexpected things happen. That’s why we have fire drills, Plan B, support groups and insurance etc. We have no choice but to deal with them as they happen.
With the recent problems fresh in my mind, and the posts of everyone in this thread, I quickly drew up the following list, which I think could be helpful as a structure to strengthen our online systems, including Autoresponder systems.
1. Prevention
– Being vigilant and monitor unusual activities
– Subscribe to relevant alert systems or news channels to be informed of problems as they arise.
– Remain in close contact with your peers. You will need to support each other in times of crisis.
– Remain in constant contact with your clients – keep the communication channel warm and responsive.
– Regular backup of client database.
– Select a backup operation system.
– Test the backup system at regular intervals – for example, quarterly or half yearly.
– Perform audit of the system to identify if there are weak links, and resolve them.
2. Crisis management
– Activate the backup system.
– Keep clients informed of status and restoration progress, whenever possible.
– Call upon the help of the community, especially peers and experts.
– Provide positive support to others who have been affected. Share ideas of proven solutions.
3. Damage control
– Fix the system as soon as possible. Switch to another system temporarily or permanently if absolutely necessary.
– Offer something special to the clients for their patience and understanding.
– Thank everyone who has helped.
4. Document the Lessons Learned to:
– Prevent future occurrences.
– Share your experience with the community.
– Develop an industrial best practice.
This is a fairly generic structure. Each point can be elaborated to relate to a particular system, or project in mind. Please feel free to add / amend / comment. Thank you!
Hope we will not get too many forced days off 🙂
Kater says
Hey Fern!
It’s clear you really put some thought into this. I can tell you have worked with businesses on crisis management. This is a topic that is easy to overlook if you are new to business or even if you have been in business a long time. I’ve seen it before and I’m sure you have too. People spend a lot of time chasing after a disaster occurs because we don’t plan for it to begin. Like this scenario. I know that I can export my lists to a spreadsheet, but have never done it until now! What is shameful is that I knew I should do this.
Ack! Thanks so much for your insight.
Fern C says
Hi Kate,
Thanks for your thoughts! Now that you have found a workaround to the Aweber outage, you can add ‘mailing list crisis manager’ to your list of skills! I do like your message: ‘NOTE: Today, my AR service is unavailable. This is a update from my personal email…..’ Is this copyrighted? This could very well be added to a template of ’email swipe file for crisis management’!
Indeed, the money we lost because of weak systems are our fees we pay to the School of Hard Knocks 🙂