How To Choose An Autoreponder - The 8 Questions You Must Ask
by Brian Cotsen

Just what should you look for when you are choosing an autoresponder to help you build your internet business?

The answer to this question will depend very much on what sort of website business you run.

This article will help you to define what your needs are and what sort of autoresponder will suit your business.

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First things first - what are you really looking for in an autoresponder?

If you are a fairly small business and just want to let people know that you have received their emails (an email acknowledgement) or let people know that you are out of the office (holiday email) then most likely your current email account will have options that you can switch on to handle this... in other words you don't need an autoresponder.

On the other hand if you are planning on building a relationship with your visitors so that you generate a feeling of trust and security in your services or product.

Perhaps you are thinking of developing an affiliate (selling other peoples products) website where you will want to inform those interested visitors about new products or offers that you have information on.

Perhaps you are building a members website where you want to capture the emails of groups of visitors so that you can create a club and contact them regularly about social events.

Then you should be thinking about using some form of autoresponder to help you with your goal.

But what should you look for in these autoresponders?

1. Use a reputable Autoresponder - click to find out more and 'why'
2. Ability to track the source of your sign ups - i.e. did they sign up from the 'motor page' or the 'flowers for sale page' - best to know what those visitors were interested in.
3. Ensure that you can set automation rules - to avoid annoying the visitors and wasting your time.
4. Optional duplicate opt out - to stop multiple requests from the same email address - more on this.
5. Spam filter checks - to ensure that you successfully send all or as many of your emails as possible.
6. To buy the software?
7. Or to use a hosted option?
8. Can I export my list if I change services or decide to buy software and host my own?

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1. Use a reputable autoresponder

Why? Well the internet today is a very different place to a few years ago.... how many spam emails do you receive each day? Perhaps not many at present but once you begin your business I guarantee that the number will go up.

So what do you do and more importantly what do your potential visitors do? They start to set up spam blocking software on their email accounts. The last thing you want is for your emails to not reach their destination.

Not only do reputable hosts like Aweber, Get Response and Constant Contact help you by giving you a feature that helps you determine the likelihood of your email being wrongly seen as spam, by the spam filters set on your respondees email accounts.

But also these companies are respected by the major Internet Service Providers (ISP) and trust that they are doing all they can to prevent spam emails being sent from their hosting software.

2. Ability to track the source of your 'sign ups'

Quite simply you will want to know which part of your website or for that matter which website (if you run more than one) that particular sign-ups came from.

This helps you to target highly interested parties in specific advertising campaigns that you may have running.

After all you don't really want to promote 'nuts & bolts' to someone who was interested in 'flowers & seeds' ... though you may be interested in cross pollinating!

Link tracking will also help you gage which campaigns are successful and which aren't getting the results that you'd hoped for.

3. Ensure that you can set 'Automation' rules.

Here you want to be able to ensure that you can set 'rules' that mean that the emailing campaign will 'stop' or 'change' if certain actions are taken

For example: If you are sending a series of 7 emails regarding a product that someone is interested in buying and after the 2nd or 3rd email the receiver decides to 'buy'.

You don't want them being sent the other 4 or 5 emails in that campaign.

Why? Well it would be annoying for one thing as it would then become spam or unwanted emails. It also would suggest that your emails weren't very personal i.e. they were all automated even if you put in the persons name.

Now ultimately they may decide to 'unsubscribe' from your email list... disaster as you won't be able to contact them regarding possible future products or services that may be of interest to them.

4. Optional duplicate opt-out.

This is quite simply a way to stop someone accidentally or even deliberately opting in to your emails more than once. After all it is difficult for us to remember which 'newsletter', 'Mini course' or what ever we have signed up to.

So with an optional duplicate opt-out you can tell the autoresponder not to resend to an email address that has already opted in for your course or whatever.

5. Spam filter checks.

As I mentioned in 1. I suggest that you make sure that the autoresponder host or software allows you to 'test' each of your emails for the likely hood of them being identified (wrongly) as spam.

6. Owning the software.

Means that you don't need to worry about the 'host' going out of business, and losing all of your contacts. Also if you buy the software outright then there are no monthly fees recurring.

You need to think about shelling out about $100.00 for a decent autoresponder software such as Autoresponse plus. If you decided to pay a monthly host around $10.00 then after 10 months your purchase of the software will clearly mean you are spending less.

However remember that you are going to have to set up the autoresponse yourself... there will be less on line help, unless you start to pay for it.

Note: You will be hosting the software and all the emails/ attachments. This may well require you to have quite a lot of extra bandwidth to cope with the movements of the emails and responses.

7. Or to use a hosted option.

Here you don't own or host the programme and so you don't have the headache of setting it all up.

The hosted solutions like Constant Contact or Get Response are very slick options that offer you a WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) ability to set up your autoresponse campaign.

The hosted solutions let you get started quickly be setting up your 'opt-in' or 'enter you email' boxes.

8. Can I export my list if I change services or decide to buy software and host my own?

This is a really important point to consider. Imagine you have been happily developing your opt-in list with company X. You have been very happy with their service and features but then you get an announcement that they are raising their prices for monthly hosting and changing some of the features that you most like.

So you start to look around for another company that will give you what you want at a price that you feel is appropriate.

This is all very well but what do you do about the large list of opt-in contacts, your 'List', that are with company X.

Make sure that you can export your contact list whenever you want to so that you are not stuck with decision... do I move to another company but loose my current opt-in list? Do I stay with Company X and suffer as a result?

I hope that this list of questions and answers helps you to decide the sort of Follow-up email marketing or autorepsonder service you require.

Get Response

Get Response was the very first Autoresponder I used. And how lucky was I that I chose them over so many others that you may come across on the Web.

Get Response hosts a fantastic and clear autoresponding service that gets your opt-in/ sign up boxes on your website in no time at all. There is no html or programming ...

 

 

Get Response and trial it for 30 days

 

AWeber

AWeber is possibly the largest and most well know of the autoresponder hosts. AWeber focus entirely on this one form of vital internet marketing.... they know what they are talking about.

AWeber have the most comprehensive support website that offers you screen shots, video tutorials and loads of free content whether you are thinking about using their service or selling their product as one of their affiliates...

 

AWeber, the choice of internet super affiliates.

 

Author Bio
Brian Cotsen writes articles and reviews tools to help you succeed with your website or online affiliate marketing. Visit www.simplewebsitemarketing.com

 

Keywords used in this article: opt-in emails, opt-in email, opt-in email campaign, opt-in email campaigns, using opt-in emails, opt-in email marketing, how to use opt-in emails, how to use an autoresponder, using autoresponders.

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