An autoresponder lets you send an email to
your subscribers a specific number of
hours or days after they have subscribed
to your mailing list. For example, if John
signs up to your mailing list today, you
can create an autoresponder to
automatically send a welcome email to him
24 hours after he subscribes.
Autoresponders are often called the
"marketer's dream tool", and in this
article I'll show you how to setup a basic
autoresponder to send an email to your
subscribers 24 hours after they join your
mailing list.
Important Note: You *must* have
cron (the scheduled sending system)
support enabled from the settings page in
order to create and send your
autoresponders, so make sure you check
that before continuing. If cron isn't
setup please contact your administrator
and ask him/her to set it up for you.
To create an autoresponder, start by
moving your mouse over the "Autoresponders"
tab and clicking the "Create Autoresponder"
menu option, like so:
To create an autoresponder, click the
"Create Autoresponder" option under the
"Autoresponders" tab.
The "Create Autoresponder" page will
appear. Choose the mailing list you want
to create the autoresponder for and click
the "Next >>" button. Complete the
autoresponder details form. The only
required field is a name for your
autoresponder, which is used to identify
the autoresponder in the control panel.
This name is not shown to your users.
You can optionally filter the email
addresses in your subscriber list using
the other options on the form, but for our
example we will send to everyone on the
list. Click the "Next >>" button when you
are done.
The only required field is the
autoresponder's name field. All other
fields are for filtering the subscriber
list, so we can skip those for now.
When the page loads, complete the form.
Pay particular attention to the "Bounce
Email" and "Hours Delayed" fields. The
"bounce email" field is the email address
where emails rejected by your subscribers
mail servers will be sent. The "hours
delayed" field tells the scheduling system
how many hours after someone subscribes to
your mailing list to send them the
autoresponder email. "0" means it will be
sent straight away.
Optionally, complete the rest of the form.
If you're unsure about any of the options
just move your mouse over the help tip to
learn more. Click the "Next >>" button to
continue.
On this page you can create the content
for your autoresponder email. Enter a
subject in the subject field. This is the
email subject line your subscribers will
see in their inbox. Enter the content of
your newsletter in the editor too. Use the
"Send Preview" option at the bottom of the
page to send yourself a preview of the
email before clicking the "Save And Exit"
button.
Congratulations, you've just created your
first autoresponder! Remember, you can
create as many autoresponders for each
mailing list as you like, so why not get
creative and use autoresponders to your
advantage?
Bonus section: Ideas for autoresponders
So how might you use an autoresponder in
your business? Here's a simple idea that's
quick and easy to implement. In this
example let's assume you sell poker chips
online from your eCommerce website.
Create a new autoresponder that's
sent 24 hours after someone subscribes
to your newsletter. In it, include text
and images describing your top selling
poker chips and at the end include a
link to "See all Top Selling Products at
MyPokerChipsSite.com"
One week later schedule another
autoresponder to your subscribers. In
it, include links to articles on your
web site that teach them how to improve
their poker/roulette/blackjack game.
Nothing draws people back to your web
site like free articles do.
Finally, create a new mailing list
and autoresponder to be sent out after
48 hours to those who order from you.
Include your customer support details,
including how they can contact you for
help, a link to your knowledge base and
any product warranty details they might
want to know.
Of course this is just one example, but
hopefully it's given you some new ideas as
to how you can use autoresponders to
improve your relationship with your web
site visitors/customers.
