Best practice for announcing switch to XenForo to 35,000 members?

I have a forum with 35,000 from as far back as 2008. I'd like to send a mass email to let all of them know about the new update, but I'm not sure the best way to go about making this announcement. Is this something XenForo can do with built-in or add-on functionality? Do I need to use a mailing service such as mailchimp? What do you guys use to format the emails/newsletters?

 

You can do it with the built-in functions, but i would use a mailing service and maybe use an html format email. Something nice.

 

Any recommendations as to which service and what to use to create a nice looking html announcement/newsletter?

 

Yep use mail chimp. That stuff is beautiful.
http://mailchimp.com/

N

 

Just publish the notification on top of your website and no need to send mass-emails.

 

Thanks Nigel!

The point of the email notification is to recapture those members who haven't visited in years

 

There's a plugin for Xenforo that will let you send emails from the admin control panel through your choice of several mailing services (including Mailchimp's Mandril service).

http://xenforo.com/community/resources/bd-mails.2313/