Creating an Autoresponder That Subscribers Look Forward To Opening

Every day, roughly 250 billion emails are sent worldwide.

Yes, that’s billion with a “b.”

Can you imagine for a moment all those millions and millions of words floating around out there: personal messages, requests to schedule meetings, reminders, and countless calls-to-action?

In the age of information, it’s almost enough to feel like we’re drowning in messages.

As a matter of fact, of the 4.3 billion email users across the globe, each office worker gets 121 emails per day.

Think about that: how are you supposed to make your autoresponder stand out from 120 other emails someone gets during their typical day?

It’s almost too much!

We can even see it now… another person is ignoring another boring email for the hundredth time today.

When will it ever end?

Yet, there’s so much more to creating autoresponders for your business.

While there are an almost limitless amount of industries in the world, there are also some tried-and-true rules for creating messages your subscribers actually want to read.

Imagine that!

With that in mind, we’re going to look at these methods step-by-step.

From getting started and gaining perspective to signing off and understanding those open rates, you’ll be a pro at sending your subscribers your autoresponders.

And your open rates and click-throughs will show it.

But the part you’ll love most is that you’ll be generating brand loyalty, getting more responses, and using autoresponders to build your business one message at a time.

Let’s get started!

Where Should You Start?

Even if you’re pretty experienced with autoresponders and email marketing, you may have noticed that things have changed drastically in recent years.

For example, increasingly, users are checking and responding to emails via growing mobile options (seriously, check out the numbers; from 8% to 48% in less than 5 years).

But it goes far beyond simply understanding how email habits are changing.

The way you can incorporate email into your marketing plan is also becoming more complex, more subtle, and better in tune with users’ needs.

Take, for instance, the amazing ability to use email content to push your audience to a Youtube tutorial about your product or service and through that video, push them toward your blog and once they’re on your site again, back into an upsell.

These sorts of complex experiences (and it can be even more refined depending on your business and level of expertise) can really increase loyalty to your brand.

But whether you’re a seasoned pro, or you’re totally new to autoresponders (and you’ve come to the right guide either way), starting is pretty simple.

If you haven’t yet chosen a service for sending your emails, check out this list of popular email marketing to get a sense of what might work for you.

Every business, small and large, has its own needs and goals. So take the time to research as many of these services as you like to decide which will be best for you.

Grab an account and then we’re ready to dive into creating your content!

Protip: While some services offer free content creation for your autoresponders, we recommend designing (or hiring someone to design) your campaign. This way, it will better represent your brand in a unique way.

Segmenting Your Leads

First, let’s tackle a vital part of your autoresponder campaign: segmenting your leads.

When it comes to your potential customers, they’re not all the same, right? Why would you want to serve up the same message to every single one of them?

And in actuality, research presented by Bigcommerce.com and Forrester have concluded that dividing up your leads into segments can overcome the fact that 42% of email users skip ever even opening an email. So how do you segment your leads?

Every business is going to be a little different, but let’s take a simple example: a small educational business that markets to both parents and teachers.

You can immediately see that the messages targeted at teachers might be very different than the messages for parents.

Though there is overlap between these two audiences, they might keep different schedules or purchase during different parts of the year.

In reality, they’re two different audiences with diverging concerns, needs, and sales potential.

But you don’t have to stop there.

While you don’t want to overcomplicate your database, consider other factors that your sub-audiences use to define themselves such as age, gender, purchasing habits, a region of the country, or even how long they’ve been customers.

You don’t have to create a new experience for every single group (and there will be overlap, of course), but making a list of these factors helps you see which audiences might need their own journey to your product or service.

Protip: Segmenting is a very powerful tool, but it can also be tempting to neglect a customer database once it’s been divided up. For several reasons (see here and here), you might want to consider having a dedicated team member or content professional keep an eye on yours throughout a campaign.

Mapping Their Journey

Probably the best metaphor to use when thinking about autoresponders is the metaphor of traveling.

Not all of your customers are headed to the same place at the same time.

But in the end, you’d like to keep them coming back in your direction.

Creating a visual content map of where you’d like to take them as they experience your brand is absolutely key to a successful autoresponder campaign.

You can grab anything from a piece of paper and a pencil to a more sophisticated piece of mapping software.

However, the point remains the same: creating a content plan.

You’ll want to create a map of what you’d like to present to them, but also what action you’d like them to take.

Let’s go back to our hypothetical educational business.

A simple map for our teachers might look something like this:

Thank you for a purchase → Reminder that you’re happy to answer questions → Sharing an interesting tip for the profession → Asking how their year is going → Highlighting a relevant testimonial with an included promotion → Asking for opinions (and comments) on a new blog article aimed at their demographic

Each of these steps serves its own purpose, but you’ll notice that this sequence is not set up like this:

Call-to-action → Call-to-action → Call-to-action → Call-to-action → Call-to-action.

By creating a more nuanced content map, you’re seeking to enhance your customer’s’ relationship with your brand.

Every step of that journey is filled with actions that grow that relationships in a different meaningful way, while keeping the conversation focused on what you can provide your customers.

This way, your audience looks forward to that next email from you because it connects with their lives.

Protip: Don’t be afraid to think outside the box. Every autoresponder campaign can have completely different steps based on where you want to take that segment of your database.

Writing the Content & Understanding Open Rates

Let’s talk about open rates. It seems that there isn’t any more misunderstood topic in the industry of marketing.

You’ll find content services that promise incredibly high open rates, or we’ve even seen promises of up to 50% response rates.

But when it comes to data, it’s best to get the facts.

Because there is a contrast for open rates between industries, we recommend taking a look at MailChimp’s benchmark list to get a better perspective on what might be standard in your industry.

But, once you’ve segmented your list and mapped out your audience’s journey, there’re a few more tricks of the trade to getting your subscribers to look forward to opening your emails.

Let’s look at subject lines and sender information first. According to Impact Branding, 33% of email users open a message based solely on the subject line.

At the same time, it’s also rather obvious that many email recipients also check to see whether they know the sender or not.

For these reasons, we recommend taking the extra time to craft an email title that is compelling and generates a response.

This is, admittedly, a little more art than science, but like with other email factors, common sense goes a long way.

For example, we’ve seen higher open rates for titles that contain the word “you” in them and more responses to emails that are composed by a singular person as opposed to a team.

It’s best to ask yourself what would compel you to open an email if you were in your customer’s shoes.

But really, in today’s marketplace, most businesses and industries will benefit from writing autoresponder content that engages their customers.

Through your content, you have a chance to build a sense of trust between you and your audience.

Then when they see your name pop up in their email, they’re far more likely to open that email from the get-go.

Focus on writing content that is compelling, that serves a purpose and adds value to their experience of your product or service.

You’ll notice more and more brands are going this route today, skipping over calls-to-action that screams “buy here now!”

Instead, brands are engaging with their customers in the same way a person would connect with another person.

By doing this, and by using our guide here, you’ll be on your way to creating an autoresponder campaign that your customers love to open and enjoy reading.

And in turn, you’ll be creating a real audience for your brand.

Protip: One of the best ways to get ideas for your autoresponders is to take a look at your own inbox. You can even sign up for your competitor’s emails to understand what messages they’re sending!

But we love to hear about your experiences: which emails have you gotten that really “wowed” you and what was it about them that caught your eye?