The Step-By-Step Guide To Email Automation.

It can be hard to run an online business, especially when you are working on your business all alone. There can be surprisingly many tasks to manage, so you must try to automate as many as possible. Luckily, email marketing can be fully automated, so you only have to write an email once and can continue to send it to your subscribers.

Email marketing is the most cost-efficient marketing strategy, meaning that this is where you spend the lowest amount of money to get the highest returns per dollar spend. But this is not the only advantage of email marketing. It also allows you to follow up repeatedly with the same subscribers without paying more or spending much time on it.

You have probably heard the saying: “The Money Is In The List.” This is especially true in affiliate marketing. Many people are directing their traffic directly to affiliate offers, but when you direct your traffic to a squeeze page to collect subscribers, you have a much higher probability of earning the affiliate commissions. Plus, you can earn on the same subscriber many times.

Below you’ll find a step-by-step guide that goes through each step of setting up email marketing with automation.

How to get started with email automation

Before you begin, you’ll need to select an email automation software to use for your email campaigns. There are many great services out there, but AWeber is without a doubt the best for affiliate marketing.

Firstly, not all services allow affiliate marketing. Secondly, many only offer some features at the low-cost plans, so you need to upgrade to take full advantage of the automation. None of that is an issue with AWeber.

Here’s a list of some of the advantages with AWeber:

• Allows affiliate marketing.
• All features are included in all plans.
• Low-cost and discounts on prepay plans.
• Unlimited email lists and campaigns.
• Landing page templates with opt-in forms.
• Integrate opt-in forms with code snippets.
• Integrates with most 3rd party software.
• Have a WordPress plugin.
• Easy import and export.
• Great support: Live chat, phone, and support tickets.
• Email templates.
• Video training and guides.
• And much more.

You get everything you need to get started with email marketing automation and always get the help you need. The best part is that it only costs $19/month for up to 500 subscribers. The next 2,000 subscribers only cost $10 more per month. And, you can even get your first month for free.

Step #1: Sign up for a free trial

The first thing you have to do is sign up for your free trial: Click here to get your free trial.

Then you have to fill in all your general and billing information. And don’t worry, they won’t charge you anything during the first month of the monthly plan. However, you will get some significant discounts when you choose to prepay for longer periods.

Step #2: Create a list

Before you get started, you should know that all subscribers are signed to a list. You can have as many lists as you want, and each list has specific campaigns. Therefore, if you collect emails in different ways, you can choose to use different lists for your subscribers to target the emails to specific needs.

Step 2.1

Create a new list by clicking “Manage Lists” in the top menu and then click the green button “Create a List.”

Step 2.2

Now you have to fill in the information about your business and the sender. The sender is the information that will appear in the emails sent to this list. You should use your name or name and company instead of just the company name to make it more personal. Click next when you filled everything out.

Step 2.3

In the next step, you have to choose a name and description for the list. These are public and can be seen, for example, when subscribers try to unsubscribe. Therefore, make sure that you focus on benefits to create an attractive title and description. This can be changed later in the list settings.

Step 2.4

The last step is to choose the language and the confirmation message. The confirmation message is used when new subscribers sign up for your list. Subscribers receive this message instantly after signing up to confirm their subscription. You can disable this later on in the list settings if you don’t want to send confirmation messages.

Edit List Settings 

Lastly, you can change the list settings by clicking on the list you want to change. The “Basic Settings” include list name, description, sender, address, and notifications. The “Personalize Your List” include company name, URL, signature, social media integration, and global text snippets. The last settings are “Confirmation Message,” where you can change the confirmation email and disable/enable confirmation on signups and imports.

Step #3: Create a campaign

Before you get started with campaigns, there is something you should be aware of. There are 2 ways to send emails to your subscribers: Campaigns and Broadcasts.

Campaigns are automated email series that are sent with a chosen time between each email. Broadcasts are emails that are sent once to the entire list. Broadcasts are great to send news updates and date-specific emails, such as for Christmas and Black Friday. You can schedule your broadcast, so they are automated for the future.

To create your email series campaign, go to “Messages” and click on “Campaigns.” On the campaigns page, click the green button “Create a Campaign.” Choose “Create a blank campaign” to start making your campaign from scratch. You can also choose the welcome or lead magnet series if you want more guidance in the beginning. Both of these pre-made campaigns come with pre-made emails that are easy to edit to your needs.

Step #4: Write email series

You need to be aware of a few things when you create your email series. You have 3 action modules on the left on the campaign screen: Send a Message, Wait, and Apply Tag. These are the building blocks that you can double click on or drag and drop into the email series. When you have added them to the email series, you can click on them and manage them in the left sidebar.

Campaign Trigger

At the top of the campaign, you can choose the trigger to be “On Subscribe” or “Tag Applied.” When you only have one campaign, you need to use “On Subscribe.” But you can use “Tag Applied” to create separate campaigns for subscribers that do specific actions, such as read an email or clicks a link.

Writing Emails

To write your emails, click on the message module once and click the green button “Create a Message” on the left. Here you can choose “Drag & Drop Email Builder,” “Plain Text Message,” and “HTML Editor.” Generally, you will get the best results using the “Plain Text Message,” but the “Drag & Drop Builder” is also great – just don’t make the emails too fancy with advanced designs. If you use the “Drag & Drop Builder,” you should create an email template before writing the emails. This can be done in the main dashboard by hovering “Messages” and clicking on “Email Template Manager.” After creating an email template, it will be available in the “Drag & Drop Builder.”

Email Content

When you write your emails, you should start with the subject line in the top left corner. Then write the email in the content section. You must have a focus on providing value in your emails. Make it worth your subscribers’ time to read the emails you send. The emails should be short, to the point, and can include links to more content or offers. It’s often a good idea to mix your emails, so you don’t spam your subscribers with offers but provide valuable information in at least 2 out of 3 emails.

It’s a good idea to create a series of emails that last at least 1-2 weeks. Then you can continue to create more emails over time while the first emails are sent to your subscribers.

Message Automation

You can add automation to your emails after you have created the email content. These are created by using the blue button “+Add Automation” in the left sidebar. First, you need to select the trigger, which can be “Opens the message” and “Clicks a link.” You can use this to either add a tag to the subscriber or remove them from the list. You can use the tags to learn about your subscriber behavior. This lets you see which subscribers are opening your emails and clicking on the links. You can also apply a tag, remove them from the list and add them to a new list using the “Tag Applied” trigger on a campaign.

When you want to analyze which subscribers are opening your emails and clicking the links, go to the main dashboard, hover “Subscribers” and click on “Manage Subscribers.” Here you can look at each subscriber and see which tags have been applied to them.

Wait Time

It will vary from niche to niche and list to list how often you should send emails to your subscribers. Some subscribers prefer to get emails every day, and others prefer a few times per week. You can also send emails at a custom time by clicking “+Add New Send Window” and choosing the time. You can also choose a day if you want it to be sent on a specific day of the week. Test what works best with your subscribers to get the best results.

Step #5: Create your opt-in form

This step will depend on your affiliate business. If you don’t already have a website, you can create a complete landing page with an opt-in form in AWeber. In case you already have a website, you can either create an opt-in form in AWeber or use software integration with AWeber. If you have a simple HTML website, then you should create a form in AWeber. But if you, for example, are using WordPress, you can integrate AWeber with the most popular plugins. Popular plugins include Bloom, Hustle, OptinMonster, Popup Maker, and more.

No matter which of the above solutions you use, AWeber makes it very simple for you. This guide will focus on the opt-in form builder from AWeber.

Start by clicking on “Sign Up Forms” in the top menu. Then click the green button “Create a signup form,” You will get to the form builder. Here you can edit the basic template or choose one of the other designs in the “Template Gallery” above the builder. Each element can be edited when you hover over the element and click the pencil in the left corner. You can also delete elements if you don’t want any of the elements in the template. You can also edit each element with colors, backgrounds, paddings, and more by clicking on the element. When your signup form design is finished, click “Go To Step 2”.

In step 2, you have to choose the form name, thank-you page, and already-subscribed page. The thank-you page is the page the subscriber gets directed to after they sign up. Here you can choose the default thank-you page, direct to a custom page you made, or let them stay on the current page. After making your choices, click “Save Your Form” and then click “Go To Step 3”.

In step 3, you have to choose how you want to publish the form. Click “I Will Install My Form,” and a code snippet will appear. Copy the Javascript Snippet and paste it into your website’s squeeze page, where you want your signup form to appear. In some cases, you’ll need to use the “Raw HTML Version.” If you have a web designer to set up your website, you can choose the second option and send the code to the designer by email.

Step #6: Start your email marketing

Now that you followed steps 1-5, you are ready to launch your new email campaign. Therefore, it’s time to generate some traffic to your squeeze page or website. You should always be aware of your conversion rates to ensure that as many people as possible sign up for your email campaign. This can be affected by your sign-up form and squeeze page.

You can learn how to create a squeeze page that converts in this guide: How To Create A Squeeze Page That Converts.

When you use a squeeze page, it’s often a good idea to use a lead magnet to encourage the visitors to subscribe. You can learn how to make a lead magnet in this guide: How To Create A Lead Magnet (E-Book).

Final Words 

You now have the tools and knowledge to set up your email automation, don’t put this off! This is one of the most important tools for affiliate marketers. The earlier you start building your email list, the more you will get out of your hard work on generating website traffic.

Even if you don’t have a website, AWeber provides everything you need to start their landing pages. Their landing pages work great and come with matching thank-you pages, which is all that you need to start using email automation in affiliate marketing.