On Netutilities.com, you can create as many mailing lists as you want and add as many e-mail addresses as you want, but you may not spam. This means that you cannot send e-mails to people who did not request to be on your mailing list. What you can do, however, is create personalized e-mails with Netutilities.com's mailing list variables. When you send an e-mail through the mailing list, each e-mail address on the list is sent an e-mail with the To field reading their e-mail address rather than something impersonal such as lists@netutilities.com. With variables, you can take this personal approach one step further. Rather than having the greeting, Dear Site User, you can have something like Dear John. Please read the section on sending e-mails to find out more.

To create a mailing list, simply go to the list administration page located at http://www.netutilities.com/members/list, and enter the name of the list in the top input field. Then hit "Create It!", and your mailing list will be activated.

To add an e-mail address to one of your mailing lists, go to the Members page located at http://www.netutilities.com/members, and enter the name of the list you want to add an e-mail address to in the input field located under "Mailing Lists". Then, hit "Go To Admin Page!", and you will be transferred to the list administration page. Next, enter the e-mail address to be added in the 1st text input field under the big heading "Add E-Mail Address To A Mailing List". After you do this, you will have the additional option of adding variables to the e-mail address. Variables allow you to send customized greetings and messages. (Please refer to the paragraph titled "Sending Your E-Mail" for more information about them.) When you enter the variables, separate them each with a space.

To edit/delete an e-mail address on one of your mailing lists, go to the Members page located at http://www.netutilities.com/members, and enter the name of the list that you want to edit/delete the e-mail address and its variables from, in the input field located under "Mailing Lists". Then hit "Go To Admin Page!", and you will be transferred to the mailing list administration page. Next, select the e-mail address/variables that you would like to change from the list located under "Edit/Delete E-Mail Address/Variables" and next to "Current E-mail Address". If your browser can read JavaScript 1.1, (Netscape 3.0 and higher and IE 4.0 and higher should be able to interpret this language.) then the e-mail address field should fill itself with the e-mail address that you selected, and the variables field should fill with the variables that correspond to the chosen e-mail address. Change the e-mail address in the "New E-Mail Address" field and the variables in the "Variables" field to edit the e-mail address. Then click on the Edit/Delete E-Mail Address/Variables to commit to these changes. Leaving the e-mail address blank results in a deletion of the address and its variables from the specified mailing list regardless of the text in the variables field.

Because each variable is separated with a space, you will need to enter <!s> if you want a space to appear in one of your variables. It will appear as <!s> if you are attempting to add/edit the e-mail address, but when you actually send your e-mail to the addresses on the list, it will show up as a space.

After you have created a mailing list and filled it with some e-mail addresses, you can send out an e-mail. To do this, go to the Members page located at http://www.netutilities.com/members and enter the name of the list that you want to use as the template for sending the e-mails. Then click on the button with the text, "Go To The Admin Page!" When you arrive at the mailing list administration page, scroll to the bottom to place where it says "Send An E-Mail." Enter the return address you want to use in the From field, the subject you want to use in the Subject field, and the Message you want in the message text area box, deleting the contents which contain some instructions. In your message, all <!var num=#> will be replaced with variables. <!var num=0> prints the receiver's e-mail address, while <!var num=1>, <!var num=2>, ..., <!var num=n> prints all of the text that you entered before the first space in the variables field, all the text you supplied between the 1st and 2nd spaces in the variable field, and all the text you entered between the (n-1)th and nth spaces in the variable, respectively, for the e-mail address that the e-mail is being sent to. For example, if the program is sending an e-mail to someone@somewhere.com and someone@somewhere.com has the variables, "John Doe $25,000", then the message "Dear <!var num=1> <!var num=2>, your e-mail address is <!var num=0>, and you have just won <!var num=3>!" results in, "Dear John Doe, your e-mail address is someone@somewhere.com, and you have just won $25,000!". Thus, the spaces act as the boundaries for variables. After you have finished entering your message, click on the "Send E-Mail!" submit button, and all people on the selected mailing list will receive your e-mail with the return address being the one you entered, the subject also being the one you entered, and the to being their e-mail address.

Instead of going to the Members Page to supply the list name, you can go directly to the list administration page located at http://www.netutilities.com/members/list, and select the name from the lists there. However, when you do this for the editing and deleting of e-mail addresses from a list, your browser will need to be able to read JavaScript 1.1. (Netscape 3.0 and IE 4.0 and later should be able to do this.) This is because the JavaScript will be the language responsible for taking you back to the page with the selected list name. Without this ability, you will not be able to select any e-mail addresses to modify because there will be no e-mail addresses on a blank unnamed list. (This should make more sense when you see the mailing list administration page.)

If you have any problems with one of your mailing lists, the error message that is displayed should provide adequate information about the nature of the problem. If you receive an error that says that some file/folder cannot be opened/created/written to, please inform webmaster@netutilities.com of the file/folder that cannot be opened. If the error says that the mailing list doesn't exist, make sure that you have selected a list in the area that you are working. (e.g. If you want to add an e-mail address, make sure that the list is selected directly below the words "Add E-Mail Address To A Mailing List".) If you get an error saying that the e-mail address was not found on the list when you are attempting to edit/delete one, make sure you selected an e-mail address from the selection list right next to the text, "Current E-mail Address/Variables:". Many if not all of the other errors should be able to be solved by actually creating the mailing lists, which are case sensitive. (e.g. List will not work on the list, list.)

If this troubleshooting paragraph does not solve your problem, please contact support@netutilities.com.