Product documentation

Email Integration (Overview)

Integrating your company's email accounts with Administrate helps centralize communication, improve visibility, and reduce manual effort.

Integrating your company’s email accounts with Administrate helps centralize communication, improve visibility, and reduce manual effort.

Administrate supports two types of email integration:

These integrations serve different purposes. CRM Email Integration captures external communication for visibility, while Enquiries Email Integration is designed for managing inbound enquiries within Administrate.

Table of contents

Add an email account

Both integrations are configured in Control Panel → Email Integration.

  1. Click Add Email Account.
  2. Enter a clear Account Name.
  3. Select a Provider:
    • Microsoft — authenticate via Microsoft sign-in
    • Custom — configure using IMAP settings
  4. If using IMAP, enter your provider’s server details (for example, server, port, username, password).
  5. Click Save.
  6. Select the folders you want Administrate to sync.

If the connection fails, Administrate will retry for up to 24 hours before disabling the account. You can edit the account and retry once credentials are corrected.

You can also use Verify Connection from the account menu to test connectivity.

Administrate cannot troubleshoot your email provider credentials or server configuration. Contact your provider if needed.

How email sync works

Once connected, Administrate monitors selected folders and syncs relevant emails into the platform.

  • Sync runs automatically every 30 minutes
  • Initial sync typically begins within 1 hour and may take up to 24 hours
  • Only emails newer than 4 days are included in the initial sync

Emails are matched to existing Contacts based on email address. When a match is found, the email (including attachments) is added to the Contact or Account history.

CRM Email Integration

CRM Email Integration syncs external email communication into Administrate’s CRM.

This allows your team to:

  • continue using their preferred email client
  • automatically capture communication history
  • share visibility across teams

This is especially useful when multiple team members work with the same Contacts or when someone is unavailable.

Note: Emails between Contacts marked as Staff are not synced.

Matched and unmatched emails

Administrate categorizes synced emails as:

  • Matched — linked to an existing Contact
  • Unmatched — no matching Contact found

You can review these from the Email Integration page.

When viewing matched or unmatched emails, you may be prompted to enter the mailbox password (not your Administrate password).

Unmatched emails are important because they highlight missing Contacts. Creating Contacts from these emails allows future communication to sync automatically.

Authentication considerations

Some email providers require additional authentication steps.

2-step verification and app passwords

  • If your provider uses 2FA, you may need an app password instead of your normal password
  • Password managers may autofill incorrect credentials — this is a common cause of sync failure

If emails are not syncing, verify that the correct mailbox credentials (or app password) are being used.

Security and network considerations

  • Email credentials are stored in an encrypted format
  • Administrate uses distributed infrastructure, so fixed IP allowlisting is not supported
  • Some enterprise email systems require VPN or IP restrictions that may block integration

Confirm compatibility with your email provider’s security policies before enabling the integration.

Third-party email encryption

If your organization uses third-party email encryption, synced emails may appear unreadable in Administrate.

In these cases, you may need to allow unencrypted delivery for the integration.

Enquiries Email Integration

Enquiries Email Integration connects shared mailboxes (for example, info@ or enquiries@) to Administrate’s Message Center.

This allows teams to manage inbound enquiries directly within Administrate.

Users can:

  • reply to emails
  • create Accounts and Contacts
  • create tasks
  • add Contacts to marketing lists
  • convert enquiries into Opportunities

Use this integration when communication should be handled collaboratively inside Administrate, rather than synced from external inboxes.