Why Newsletter Publishers Need Autoresponders
Articles & Tips - Justin Premick - August 7th, 2006 - PermalinkIn my time at AWeber, I’ve been struck by the number of people who manage newsletters using either our broadcasting feature or Feed Broadcaster, but who make zero use of the ability to send autoresponders and timed follow up messages to subscribers.
I understand, of course, that newsletters contain date and time-specific information, and that broadcasting is the best way to send a newsletter… but why don’t newsletter senders use autoresponders too?
I don’t fault clients for this. I don’t use 90% of my cell phone’s features. I know how to do what I need to do with it, and the other features just get in my way. It’s natural that a newsletter publisher might feel the same way about autoresponders.
The thing is, autoresponders are a great tool for newsletter publishers! It’s just a question of learning to use them to complement a newsletter…
Create a Welcome Message
As far as I’m concerned, there is no newsletter publisher who shouldn’t have at least one autoresponder message set up. Nobody.
When visitors subscribe to your newsletter, send them a welcome message. In it, thank them for subscribing and give them a taste of the great content they’re going to benefit from in the coming weeks/months/years.
This message doesn’t have to be long, just a paragraph or two to get your new subscribers excited about the upcoming issues. Include a link to your site , and if you publish your newsletter issues on your website, make it a link to those archives. That way, if your next issue isn’t going out for a few days, you stay in subscribers’ inboxes (and on their minds), and you drive them back to your site.
Generate Feedback
I personally like the idea of creating a follow up message to be sent out to newsletter subscribers around three weeks or so after the welcome one.
Why a few weeks after the welcome message instead of a few days? Unless your newsletter issues are spaced far apart, after a few weeks new subscribers have received several issues and have a pretty good idea of what you’re providing them. They’re ready to tell you what they like about it, and how you can improve it.
So ask them what they think! Send out a message asking for their opinion on your newsletter. Not only will this help you improve future issues, but it’ll also keep your subscribers engaged and active on your list, which means they’ll be less likely to unsubscribe.
Do you have any other suggestions on how autoresponders can be used to complement newsletters? Share them below!
This entry was posted on Monday, August 7th, 2006 at 9:49 am and is filed under Articles & Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment response, trackback from your own site, or permalink.
April 14th, 2007 at 12:13 pm
Do you have any tips on spacing these messages out? I am a little confused on how to mix autoresponders with scheduled broadcasts with newsletter broadcasts.
All of these are good, but what if people recieve 2 messages on the same day? is that bad? if you’ve used autoresponders and advanced schedule broadcasts and send newsletters, you could potentially send 3 messages in a day.
Just curious your thoughts…I guess you would see the scheduled broadcast though so you probably wouldn’t send a newsletter on that day.
April 17th, 2007 at 12:32 pm
Hi Jesse,
You’re right - you have to exercise some caution to avoid over-mailing subscribers inadvertently.
I don’t have a specific set of intervals that I recommend for this, since everyone broadcasts at different times (weekly, biweekly, monthly, whenever they have content).
It’s also a question of how many follow ups you’re going to do. If you’re only doing 1 or 2, just set them a few days to a week apart and let them run for a while. Even if someone gets two messages in a day once, that may not necessarily be a bad thing.
You just have to put your follow ups in there, pick intervals, try it out and adjust as you go. Your subscribers will let you know (by emailing you and/or by unsubscribing) if you’re mailing too often.
June 26th, 2007 at 8:45 am
[…] In an earlier article, Justin gave a few reasons why newsletter publishers also need autoresponders. […]
July 8th, 2007 at 5:52 pm
Great tip in adding an aweber comment form like this one to the Newsletter or even an autoresponder. On the subject of extras in html newletters. Is it ok to place a couple of Ad-Sense images and of COURSE an AWEBER Affilate ad?
January 29th, 2008 at 10:26 am
[…] A while back, Justin published an article discussing why email newsletter publishers need autoresponders, meant to motivate senders who focus solely on newsletters (broadcasts) to also schedule a few follow up messages. […]
February 14th, 2008 at 12:34 am
Just came across this from a link from a current blog post - very interesting - thanks! As I’ve looked at autoresponders, they seem really well suited for the marketer selling a single targeted product, maybe with a few upsales in sequence after that. I wonder if there is an application for autoresponders for the marketer, like myself, that is selling hundreds of products on more of a catalog site (e.g. see my site http://www.YouCanMakeThis.com)? Any expert opinion on utilizing autoresponders in this environment would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
February 14th, 2008 at 9:00 am
Hi Ryan,
You might offer specials/coupons by email (using broadcasts to send out your promotions) and use autoresponders to:
* introduce new subscribers to different departments/sections of your site/catalog
* highlight selling points like free shipping, comparison tools, user reviews, customer service, etc.
Once someone purchases from you, you might use autoresponders to build customer loyalty through a post-purchase email marketing campaign. You could also survey customers to learn where you can improve to better serve them.
February 14th, 2008 at 12:55 pm
Great suggestions, Justin. I’m going to implement some of these right away and see how they go. I like the selling points series for customers. We have a lot of repeat customers, so I’ll have to figure out how to make sure they don’t get boarded onto the series everytime they make a purchase.
Another concern is requiring people that are already on other lists, like our newsletters, to opt in to every autoresponder series we might want to do - seems like that could get confusing and, possibly, annoying (e.g. "I already opted in with these guys, why do I have to do it again?!). Thoughts?
Thanks for the great ideas on utilizing aweber.