Automatic Processing of Unsubscribe Requests via an Outlook Rule

Michael

Yes.  we all get them.  Who in your organization handles all those   manual requests that come out of Convio when someone tries to  unsubscribe but the system isn't able to identify them?  Someone  hopefully

At CARE, that  person is me, and it's a royal PITA.  Up until today,  I had built out a  lightweight tool webpage that simply let me copy and  paste the e-mail  into a form field and hit submit and the convio API did  the rest.   Simple, easy...  and great when there are only a handfull to  run.   Well, I've been out of the office for several days and there were  about  100 or so backlogged.  I'm a code geek, as much as I hate to  admit it,  and I'm also as lazy as the day is long.  So.  I built an a  better  mousetrap for myself, and thought I'd share in case anyone is   interested.  Probably, Convio will remove this like they have several   other posts I've made that were fairly complex and technical, but oh   well, I'll give it one last try.  First off, yes, this will require  some  technical knowledge and a few prerequisits for this solution to  work.   Remember, this works on MY computer, your mileage may vary, but  if  you're like some help, let me know!

1. You must  have  Perl install on your machine (I'm assuming Windows here since it's  all  about Outlook -- you Mac users are SOL as usual...  makes ya  think, huh?  Form over function and all that.........).  You can get  that free from  http://www.activestate.com.  Just the vanilla install  will do, but  remember where you install it, because that WILL MATTER.  I  have mine  installed at "C:\\Perl" to make things easy on myself.
2. I  am using Outlook 2003.  Don't know if later version work the same way   or not.  Probably, but don't bet on it.
3. My  computer is running  Windows 7, but since the tools in use here don't  require Windows 7 to  run, that should matter, as long as you have  Outlook, you should be  fine.
4. The rule I'm setting  up isn't designed to be a  server-side rule, nor is it designed to run  automatically (generally,  you don't want this type of rule running  without supervision...).

Ok,  with that out of the way, here goes!

Part One:  The  Perl script.

Attached to this document are two files.  One is  called unsubproc_template.pl.  Download that and rename it to  unsubproc.pl and remember where you put it.  Download the other one and  put it in the same directory.  Open the upsubproc.pl file in a text  editor.  On line 1, it says "#!C:/Perl -w"  This is the perl "shebang"  line (don't ask, just accept the name and move on) -- change it so that  it matches where your Perl processor was/is installed.  There are 5  things you need to edit in this file, they are all marked.  It's the URL  for your API based on your site's instance, your API Key, your API  Admin credentials and a path for this program's output log.  For  simplicity sake, use the same path as the file -- can be anything  though, if you want.  Note, though, to use slash characters "/" in the  Perl file.

Part Two:  The Outlook script.

That's  the easy part, not for the annoying Microsoft portion of this  adventure:

1. Open Outlook
2. Go to Tools >  Macros > Visual Basic Editor (or just key Alt+F11)
3. You should  see something on the right that says "Project1" and under it a folder  that says "Microsoft Office Outlook Objects" -- expand that.
4. You  should now see something that says "ThisOutlookSession" -- click that  (or maybe double click).
5. Now, unless you or someone you know (or  don't know....) has edit this before, you should have a blank document  on the right.  Open the  OutlookVBACode.txt file and paste it, in it's  entirety, here.  If you already have code there, simply remove the  "Option Explicit" line from the text file first and paste the contents  below whatever is already there.
6. The only line you need to  change is where it says "Const ExternalProcessor As String" -- Change  that to be the path to the Perl script you installed above -- this time  make sure to use BACKSLASHES "\\" instead since that's what Windows  expects.

You don't need to edit anything else in  this file.  Paste it, edit that path, and save it.  Then, File >  Close and Return to Microsoft Outlook (or just key Alt+Q).

Part  Three: The Rule

Now, it's the (more or less) easy  part.  At least, its the part that you, dear reader, are most likely to  be familiar with anyway.

1. In Outlook, go to Tools  > Rules and Alerts.
2. Click New Rule
3. Create rule  conditions that are very specific to the Convio emails.  For example, I  have conditions that allow this rule to file only when the e-mail is set  TO the correct address and contains "Unsubscribe Request: "  (the From  seems to show up as an On Behalf Of thing... so I didn't use that...).   When you're done, click Next.
4. For the Action, scroll down and  select "run a script"
5. When prompted, select  "Project1.ThisOutlookSession.ConsUnsubProc" as the script.  Probably  you'll only have that one, but if you've done other custom work, or have  installed other macros or something, there might be more there.  Click  Next.
   
6. Probably don't need any exceptions, just click Next.
7. Give  it a name -- I called mine Convio Unsubscribe Processor, but if you  want to call it the Purple Cow Bucket or something, feel free (whatever  floats your boat, chief).
8. Don't set the rule as "on" because you  don't want this running by itself (generally, it's a bad idea for rules  that run scripts to run all willy nilly).
9. Click Finish.

Part  Four: Make it so!

So, it's all set up.  Lets see  it in action, w00t!   Go to the email folder that has all the  unsubscribe emails in it.  It doesn't have to be exclusive, since you  set your rule up to only process the correct emails (right??).  If you  didn't, any e-mail address that has a subject line with an e-mail  address as the third word will get opted out....  By word, I mean and  peice of text with a space before it.  So, if the subject line was "My  Email: bobby@joe.com" then, bobby@joe.com would get opted off your  list.  That's why the criteria you set up are are so important.

1. Go  to the folder, and click Tools > Rules and Alerts.
2. Click Run  Rules Now
3. Check the box of the new rule you created in Part  three, don't check any other boxes.
4. Click Run Now -- you'll see a  bunch of command prompt boxes open and close and depending on your  internet connection, computer processor and the number of e-mails in the  box, this could take a while.  It IS NOT DONE until all the command  prompt boxes close.
5. When done, click Close on the rules box and X  out of the Rules and Alerts dialog.
6. Now, open the log file that  will have been created magically wherever it was you specificed in the  Perl script.  You'll see the XML return data that the convio API threw  back.  Generally, you should see success statements and Convio IDs,  etc.  If you see any errors messages, you'll need to follow up on those  manually since clearly, those e-mails didn't get opted out.
7. Lastly,  when you're done, you can delete, or file, or print out and roll around  on (ew) all the unsub e-mails that you never actually had to open!   whoooohooooo!

As I said, this is something I created for myself, but I thought perhaps I would be helpful.  I'd love to hear back from anyone who has tried this.

-mike