Functionally for JO, there is no difference. The experience for receiving and replying to customer replies is different between a distro list and a shared inbox. With a shared inbox all conversations happen in one place but a distro list may have conversations that become 1:1 with the customer and your rep, which would be less visibility for the entire group unless the distro list was included as a CC on all replies.

The same could happen with a shared inbox depending on the email application or service you use -- but most have threaded conversations that be visible to those using the inbox.

Thanks for replying @john_apple! That’s a good explanation. 

Could you please guide me with a couple more of questions?

1. How can we create a DL in JO?
2. If we CC for example a representative for every customer? Does the representative get that specifically email that we send to each individual customer? Let’s say we have 2 customers Kevin whose representative is Denise, and Maria whose rep is Matt. We will send an individual customized email to Kevin which content is different to Maria’s. Does Denise receive the copy for Kevin?
3. My team is considering the option for CC reps so is simple program be the best option for this? Even though we do still need to send some more emails. 

Thanks for your help! :D 

Sorry for the questions, I’m still learning how to use GS and I’ve been struggling with the business strategy while learning how to use the tool.

Ah okay - I guess the best place to start is to ask “what’s the end goal?” It sounds like there is a need/desire to email customers at scale and you’d like the email to copy their rep.

Within JO, you specify who you are sending to (customer email) and who it will come from. You can also specify a reply-to address as well as cc as you mentioned.

When you send, the from address could be a static email (joe@xyx .com) or it could be dynamically populated by the program (each recipient gets an email from their CSM, for example). If you use a fixed static email address this could be a DL or shared inbox address -- both are email addresses they are just setup differently by your email service. 

To CC the CSM or rep, you would need to make sure that their email field is part of the data. Advanced Programs do this in the Source setup and Simple Programs could do this in the source data or you can add a field when setting the CC. True CC can only be used with Operational Email templates due to opt-outs present on non-operational email templates. For non-operational, you can use Email Copy but this creates a separate email sent to the alternative address provided vs CC where all recipients would be on the same email.

Lastly, it is possible to send the same email to multiple people at the same company. Simple Programs can do this automatically using Group Email and you can kind of do this with Advanced Programs and CC but it’s harder and limited in how many addresses you can have. Group Email can also only be used with Operational Email templates because there isn’t an opt-out option.

Hope that helps!

@john_apple You’re my angel  Thanks for elaborating and being so patient with me. It was really helpful, you gave me ideas on how to do it. Appreciate it!! You rock!!