The Outbound Script Wizard allows you to create scripts that create outgoing e-mail. With the Outbound Script Wizard you can:
· send follow up e-mail
· send payment reminders
· send regular newsletters or customer information
· send personalized mailings
The Outbound Script Wizard includes the following dialogs that you can configure:
Dialog 1. Specify database
Specify the database from which Emailrobot must retrieve the recipient details.
Dialog 2. Specify fields
Emailrobot will list all retrieved database fields under 'Available fields'. You must now indicate which fields you will be using in your Outbound Script. In many cases you will be using fields such as: Email address, Name, Company, Product interest, Date last contacted, etc. To select fields, click on an available field and click on 'à'. If you want to deselect a field, click on it and click 'ß'.
Dialog 3. Conditions
This dialog allows you to set conditions according to which Emailrobot will determine whether to send out an e-mail or not. (i.e. Emailrobot will query the database with these conditions)
For example, if you have a database with prospects, and you wish to send your Swedish resellers a special offer in Swedish, you will need to set the 'Country' equal to 'Sweden', and the 'Customer Type' equal to 'Reseller'. If your offer is only meant for Swedish resellers interested in a particular product, you would have to set an additional condition for the product interest field.
Dialog 4. Update database field (Flag).
This function is handy if you want to keep track of which customers you have already sent a follow up e-mail. To do this, you must add a separate field in your database, called a flag. For instance you could call this field 'Mail Sent'. If Emailrobot comes across this flag when processing your mail, it will automatically update it to the name you entered in the dialog. For instance if you enter 'TRUE', Emailrobot will set the flag field to 'TRUE' for each customer who received an e-mail. You could thus eliminate a re-send of the follow-up mail next time you run the script.
Dialog 5. Specify e-mail text
This dialog allows you to specify what e-mail text you wish to send. You can personalize an e-mail by using fields in the text.
For example, you could write:
Dear [*Firstname*]
Thank you for your interest in [*Product*]. We are sure that our product will work well within [*Company*].
Note, that for this example to work, you would need to have the fields [Firstname], [Company] and [Product] in your database.
Dialog 6. Email options
This dialog allows you to specify the Subject line, and Reply To address. You must also indicate the database field where the e-mail addresses of the recipients are stored, e.g. 'Email Address'.
You can also delay sending the e-mail, by using the option 'Send after <number> hours'. In addition you can attach a file to the e-mail.
Dialog 7. Description
Here you must give the script a description and enter the file name in order to save the script in the Program Files\ERobot\scripts\files directory. You can also specify whether Emailrobot should 'Add comments in the script file' (this is only useful if you plan to edit the scripts at a later stage), or 'Hold mail in queue for previewing'. This last option will allow you to preview the email before it is sent out. You can preview the e-mail in the 'Emailrobot Queue view utility'. Remember that no e-mail will be sent out before you preview it and send it out!
After creating the script, you will be able to view your settings an change them if necessary. After you click 'Finish', the 'Task Properties' dialog will automatically pop up. Here you can specify when the Emailrobot should run your script (=Task). You can specify to run it manually (from the menu 'Task', 'Run now'), each time e-mail is downloaded, or at scheduled intervals. After configuring when you wish Emailrobot to run the script, click 'OK'. Your task will now be listed in the main window of the Emailrobot Task manager.
If you later wish to edit the script, you can do so by selecting it in the 'Emailrobot Task Manager' and choosing 'Edit Script' from the 'Task' menu. If you wish to remove it, choose 'Remove Script'.