Just got this email with the subject line:

“Unfortunately, FeedmailPro will be shutting down on December 1st, 2010.”

Fortunately, I couldn’t really find a Freedmail Pro account that I was using, so I won’t have to go through the transition process. I guess I wasn’t that impressed with their service and just signed up for an account but never really put it into use. I used MailChimp instead. Well, good on me! But if I had, I’d be in the middle of transitioning accounts (hopefully not dozens or hundreds that I set up for clients) from FeedmailPro to MailChimp. Ouch.

When I’m setting up services for my website–and for those of my clients–I’m not only looking at the features and services, but I’m trying to gauge if they’ll be around for a while. I try to use well-known names, but not only the big guys just because they’re the big guys. For example, I don’t use Constant Contact, but I use MailChimp. Why? Because MailChimp doesn’t stick you with a monthly fee even if you don’t send out any emails. Well, it also has an excellent RSS-to-Email feature that works wonders. I use GoDaddy for low-cost domains because I like the control you have over things like DNS information, MX records and A records. I love HostGator for fast WordPress hosting because they are super fast, low cost, and use cPanel. I use Google Apps for email because of their reliability, features, and the fact that many people know and love the Gmail interface. Oh, don’t forget WordPress! I use exclusively WordPress for building websites because it’s beautifully built and has the user base, developer backing, and fanatic support I would hope for in a content management system.

Here’s the full email from FeedmailPro:

You’re receiving this notice because you have a FeedmailPro account.

Unfortunately, FeedmailPro will be shutting down on December 1st, 2010 and not delivering any more email after that time.

We’ve created a process to transition all FeedmailPro users over to MailChimp (they offer an excellent RSS-to-Email product which we think you’ll enjoy). However, some action is required on your part.

Please click here for more details:

http://feedmailpro.com/mailchimp

There was also a good write-up on MailChimp from the FeedmailPro founder:

Why MailChimp?

I’ve been tracking their service for a while and simply put, they know what they are doing. They also have a large team and infrastructure that is capable of handling the sort of volume and potential emergencies that come from running a service like this. They are a world class Email Service Provider, and they aren’t going anywhere.

In fact, with the features they’ve been adding over the past few years (especially the same 1000 subscribers for free accounts) their service is quite a bit better than FeedmailPro (certainly more full featured), so there is really no reason not to use them. I suspect their deliverability is also better than FeedmailPro, so this will be a nice bonus when switching over.