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Using Mandrill with Exchange 2013 to send outgoing mail in case your IP ADDRESS gets blacklisted on SENDERBASE.ORG and your reputation takes awhile to get out of the POOR rating. There are two parts to this; creating a MANDRILL account and setting EXCHANGE to use MANDRILL.

CREATE A MANDRILL ACCOUNT

• -start a MANDRILL account at https://mandrillapp.com

Once you start an account, you will see your details for connection. It will look something like this:

• Host: smtp.mandrillapp.com
• Port 587
• SMTP Username: foo@fee.tld
• SMTP Password any valid API key

Now all you need is an API KEY.

• -click NEW API KEY

Be patiance as it generates a new api key. It will display after about 20 seconds. Great! You should have your new API-KEY to be used as your SMTP-PASSWORD.

NOTE: It uses an api key rather than the password to your account so that you can change the password to your account without affecting the accounts ability to send email.

SET EXCHANGE TO USE MANDRILL

• -open the EXCHANGE ADMIN CENTER (EAC) also known as the EXCHANGE CONTROL PANEL (ECP).
• -click MAIL-FLOW (on the right-hand side).
• -click SEND-CONNECTORS (at the top).
• -click the plus symbol (+).
• -type: Mandrill.
• -bullet "Custom".
• -click NEXT.
• -bullet "Route mail through smart host".
• -click the plus symbol (+).
• -type: smtp.mandrillapp.com
• -click SAVE
• -click NEXT
• -bullet BASIC AUTHENTICATION
• -type: your-user-email-for-your-mandrill-account
• -type: your-user-password-for-your-mandrill-account
• -click NEXT
• -click the plus symbol (+) for ADDRESS SPACE.
• -leave TYPE as SMTP.
• -type * (asterisk) for FDQN.
• -leave COST as 1
• -[This is preference. Works the same as MX RECORD preferences. The lower the cost, the more preference it has. 1 will be used before 2 and so on. An equal number will round-robin.].
• -click SAVE
• -[A "Scoped send connector" will only work internally for domains on the server.]
• -click NEXT
• -click the plus symbol (+) for SOURCE SERVER.
• -if you only have 1 server, click ADD (at the bottom).
• -click OK > FINISH.

This will automatically add the SEND CONNECTOR to the list and enable it.

Now we have to change the outgoing port for the MANDRILL SEND CONNECTOR.

• -disable the MANDRILL SEND CONNECTOR.
• -open the EXCHANGE MANAGEMENT SHELL (EMS).
• -type: Set-SendConnector -Identity Mandrill -port 587

Great! Now you are ready to go.

You have a few options from here. You can either:

• -start sending using the MANDRILL SEND CONNECTOR right away by simply enabling the connector (and disabling the existing connector if you have one).

or

• -test out the MANDRILL SEND CONNECTOR by pausing the SEND QUEUE in the QUEUE VIEWER and enabling the connector (and disabling the existing connector if you have one).

That's it! You are awesome.