Automated E-Mail Responses: More Sales, Less Hassle

E-mail is a powerful selling tool, but it can be time-consuming to compose and send individual messages.

It would be wonderful if every sales prospect immediately recognized the value of the product or service that you described in your first e-mail--but that doesn't always happen.

Most sales happen after the prospect receives multiple e-mails detailing the benefits of your offer. Expensive products (which are often more profitable) may require five or more exchanges before the sale closes.

If you juggle many prospects at once, consider using a sequential autoresponder service like GetResponse to manage a series of messages. Automated sales messages can be just what's needed to convert an indecisive prospect to a new customer.

You're probably familiar with the concept. One common example is the vacation autoresponder, which automatically replies to incoming e-mails with a standard message stating that the e-mail account owner is away from the office. This lets correspondents know they will need to wait longer than usual before receiving a personal response.

A sequential autoresponder used in marketing takes this concept to a higher level by sending sales prospects a series of automatically generated messages. Each message provides new sales offers or additional information regarding the benefits of your business products or services. You determine both the content of the messages and the intervals between each e-mail.

Sequential autoresponders often let you personalize the canned response, such as referring to the prospect by name. Many also allow you to track how many recipients open your messages and provide sales results to help you gauge the effectiveness of your campaign.

Your existing customer list can be a good starting point for building a database of autoresponder subscribers. Someone who has already purchased from you is a good prospect for sales of additional related products and services.

You could also place a form on your Web site, inviting visitors to submit their name and e-mail address in order to receive additional information.

Finally, you can acquire a list of prospects from a third party. One way that can work well is by using what's known as lead co-generation, obtaining leads from a business that sells a related product or service.

If you send bulk e-mail for commercial purposes, you should be aware of the federal CAN-SPAM law.

The law requires that you give people on your mailing lists a means of unsubscribing from your autoresponder at any time. In addition, you cannot use misleading or deceptive headers or subjects. All messages must include a valid postal e-mail address.

In addition to following CAN-SPAM's requirements, I strongly recommend that you employ a double opt-in method to acquire new e-mail addresses. This means that after someone requests information and submits an e-mail address, perhaps by using a Web form (the first opt-in), they must confirm that they really want the information by responding to a message sent to their address (the second opt-in). This keeps people from adding others to a mailing list without their consent.

While it's possible to manage sequential e-mail messages manually, doing so is both time-consuming and complicated. A Web-based service such as GetResponse can manage the process by sending messages on schedule, while helping to ensure you don't fall afoul of CAN-SPAM.

Creating an autoresponder message in GetResponse is straightforward. You complete a Web form by adding the e-mail subject, text, and time interval in days since the last message, then select options such as tracking clicks and any resulting sales.

You can sign up to GetResponse's free service to see if it meets your needs--but there are some limitations. For example, this basic service permits text e-mail only, restricts the number of autoresponders to five, and adds an advertisement to each message.

The GetResponse Pro service costs $18 per month, supports an unlimited number of autoresponders, handles HTML e-mail, and removes the advertising.

GetResponse supports the double opt-in subscription method that I described, which it calls Confirmed Opt-In. The service also offers additional e-mail services, such as broadcast mailing lists that do not feature autoresponders.

If you like the idea of using an e-mail list but don't require sequential autoresponders, read my earlier column, "Making Your Mailing List Work for You."

Will your prospects and customers find autoresponder messages helpful reminders or time-consuming annoyances?

I don't think it's possible to predict how they'll respond. Testing an autoresponder campaign isn't expensive: Using GetResponse Pro for five months will cost just $90. The service's tracking reports will help you determine whether the campaign is paying off in increased sales.