Auto Responders For Small Business Email Marketing

The main use being for auto acknowledgment of a sale or request for information/support.

 They are still used for this purpose today. But they have evolved to become more like mailing list managers and today they are the main tool used in permission based email marketing .

Their uses include:

• To acknowledge receipt of technical support requests, sales information requests etc. In any situation were the customer needs reassuring that his request, order etc is being dealt with.
• They can be used to send prospective customers fixed information like price lists or FAQ.
• They can be used to send email course modules, newsletters, special offers.
• They can be used for email capture ( creating mailing lists).

Important Autoresponder Features

• Subscribe/unsubscribe web forms
• Email Tracking
• Scheduled sending
• Personalisation Options
• List segmentation
• List Import and export capability
• Easy Message Editing
• Good deliverability
• HTML and Text messages

• HTML templates
• Postcards

Autoresponder Service or Software

There are two main types of commercial Autoresponder:

• Autoresponder Software- You buy the software and install it on your own server. This solution requires that your host supports the necessary features and requires more work/knowledge on your part.- Not recommended for the small business owner

• Autoresponder Service- Here the autoresponder software resides on another server and you simply subscribe to the service. This is by far the most common method used, and although it generally works out more expensive it is far easier to set up and more flexible. This is the recommend option for small business owners

Which Autoresponder?

If you have a large mailing list (>250) and send frequent messages then you should take a look at Get Response.

 If you have a small mailing list and send infrequent messages then you should take a look at VerticalResponse You may want to take a look at Autoresponder quick price compare.

Using Autoresponders

The early use of auto responders involved a link on a website or a newsletter like:

 Send an email to freereport@autoresponder.com to get my free report on xyz.

When a email was sent to the above address the autoresponder would respond by sending the free report to the sender as a  "follow up" email.

It is rare to see email links like the above due to email spam ( see hiding email addresses).

Instead most websites use a website form, the email being captured by an autoresponder system which handles the request.

Autoresponders and Mailing Lists

Over the years autoresponder systems have evolved to include the ability not only to respond to messages but to initiate them i.e. they have developed many of the functions of mailing lists and vice versa.

Therefore the distinction between the two is very blurred such that autoresponder software/services have the ability to manage mailing lists and vice versa.

• Email Marketing For Small Businesses
• Collecting Email Addresses
• Autoresponder Guide
• Autoresponder Review
• Why Use An Autoresponder