Setting up a Group Mailing List
One of the challenges of running a successful web site is retaining visitors. You can achieve more returning visitors by updating your site frequently with new unique content of interest. Also, you can encourage return visits by notifying visitors of new information or items available on your site; ask visitors to click the Contact button on your site to provide you with an email address where you can send them notices of updates to your site.
By setting up a Group Mailing List in your WebMail account, you can quickly and easily send an email message to an entire list of people whenever you have something new on your web site to announce, in the same time that it takes to send an email to a single individual. In today’s post, we discuss how to create a mailing list to streamline your email communications to groups.
First, login to your WebSpawner web site account and then click the WebMail icon in the Member Menu:
(Note: WebMail is only available if you have an Enhanced account with WebSpawner. If you don’t see the WebMail icon as shown above, click the Enhance Your Site icon which appears there instead to upgrade and add many additional tools and features to your account and web site! You’ll have access to the WebMail icon after your upgrade is complete, as well as to unlimited page creation, image gallery creation and more.)
Next, in the WebMail window, click the Address Book link in the toolbar on the left:
The Address Book screen will appear, showing any Individuals or Groups that you have previously added. Click the Add New Group Entry link:
The next window to appear will look like this:
In this window, you need to do three things:
- Next to Nickname, enter a name for your Group in the box, such as “Visitors List” or whatever you choose.
- In the Addresses box, enter the email addresses for the individuals that you wish to place in this Group list. Each email address must be complete, and you should enter a comma between each address.
- When you have finished entering the Nickname and Addresses for your Group, click the Add New Entry button.
When the screen refreshes, you’ll see your new Group appearing in the menu, as shown in the next image below. You can then add another Group by clicking Add new Group Entry and repeating the steps above; or, you can edit any Group in the list by clicking on the Group’s Nickname to add or remove addresses.
When you are ready to prepare an email message to send to a Group, click the Compose link on the toolbar at the left, as shown here:
In the message Compose window, any Individual or Group addresses that you have added will appear in a box to the right of the screen. Select your Group list in the box, and then click the To: button to send your new message to all members of that Group with all addresses visible, or click the BCC: button to send your message to all members with the addresses of other members hidden:
Now enter your Subject line and body of your message and click the Send button. A copy of your email will be sent to all members of the Group you selected.
In this manner you can save yourself considerable time whenever you have news to share with multiple individuals by email.
A closing reminder and disclaimer regarding the Group list feature: The people that you add to your Group lists should be people who have provided you with their email addresses themselves and are expecting to receive email from you on occasion. If an individual contacts you and asks you to stop sending them email, you should honor that request by editing your Address Book to remove the email address from your Group list(s). WebSpawner’s Customer Agreement prohibits the use of WebSpawner’s services for the purpose of sending unsolicited or unwanted “spam” emails.