Marketing email at Hiveku follows a deliberate build-vs-send model:
you can create campaigns, design templates, build audiences, import
contacts, and save sequences at any time — without any account or
domain configuration. Setup is only required when you actually click
Send, Schedule, or Test send.
This page explains exactly what that means and how to unblock sending.
The amber banner at the top of every /dashboard/marketing/* page
surfaces the most-blocking gate currently failing for your account,
with a one-click CTA to the right setup screen. You can ignore it
while building; it’ll auto-hide the moment everything is ready.
What you can do without any setup
| Action | Requires setup? |
|---|
| Create / edit / delete audiences | No |
| Import contacts via CSV | No |
| Create / edit / delete templates | No |
| Use the visual builder + preview templates | No |
| Create / edit / delete campaigns | No |
| Create / edit / delete sequences | No |
| Create static + dynamic audience filters | No |
| Browse the deliverability dashboard | No |
| Use the AI marketing agent for planning + critique | No |
What requires setup
| Action | Required setup |
|---|
| Send a campaign now | All four gates below |
| Schedule a campaign for later | All four gates below |
| Test-send to your own inbox | Marketing enabled + tenant active |
| Enroll a contact in a sequence (will fire emails) | All four gates below |
The four gates (in order)
The dispatcher checks these every time a send is attempted. The setup
banner surfaces the first failing one as the primary CTA.
1. Marketing enabled (Hiveku staff action)
Marketing email is enabled per-account, not by default. Hiveku staff
flip this on after a brief consent conversation about your list source
and CAN-SPAM compliance. This is the one gate you can’t self-serve.
To unblock: email support@hiveku.com
with a summary of your intended use case (broadcast newsletter, drip
sequence, etc.) and a confirmation that your list has documented
opt-in consent.
2. SES tenant active (automatic after gate 1)
Once marketing is enabled, Hiveku provisions an isolated SES tenant
for your account (this isolates your sending reputation from other
Hiveku customers’). The tenant becomes active automatically when
provisioning completes — typically seconds.
If stuck in pending: contact support so we can re-run the
provisioning script.
3. Verified email domain
You need at least one email domain on your account in
verification_status='verified' so SES knows you control the
from-address you’re sending from. This is the same domain verification
flow used for transactional email — verify a domain once and it
unlocks both transactional + marketing sending.
To unblock: go to
Email Service → Domains,
click “Add domain”, enter your domain, paste the DKIM CNAMEs + SPF +
DMARC records into your DNS provider, hit “Verify”. Status flips to
verified once SES picks up the records (5-30 min for DNS propagation).
Verified domains show a violet Marketing-ready badge on the email
service page so you know they’re available as marketing from-addresses.
The campaign’s from_email must be on a verified domain owned by
your account. Sending from noreply@yourdomain.com requires
yourdomain.com to be verified, not just any domain you’ve added.
4. CAN-SPAM physical address
US law (CAN-SPAM Act) requires every commercial email to include a
valid physical mailing address. Hiveku enforces this at the dispatch
layer.
To unblock: add your address in
Account Settings (street, city, ZIP at minimum).
This will be auto-injected into your email footer if not already
present in your template.
Pause is a separate state
Even when all four gates pass, your account can be in a paused state
(set by Hiveku staff when reputation drops below threshold). When
paused, the dispatcher refuses sends with a banner explaining why and
how to resolve it.
The pause/unpause flow is staff-only today — contact support if you
believe a pause was applied in error.
