UPDATE: The Nickel Sale is over but you can purchase the WordPress AutoResponder using the payment button below.
***
As you might have guessed from the title, the plugin I’ll be launching is a WordPress autoresponder.
I’ve long thought about how nice it would be to have a simple autoresponder *plugin* rather than have to mess about with setting it all up in an autoresponder service. I don’t know about you but I’ve always thought it a bit like using a sledgehammer to crack a peanut.
I have plenty of little niche blogs that I’d like to gather names and email addresses through, but because they’re niche sites, it’s never seemed worth the hassle of setting it up in the autoresponder service I use.
I mean, come on, how useful is it in my main niche to gather a list of people interested in petrol lawn mowers for instance? 😉
Even ignoring the niche aspect of the plugin, I figured that for lots of people just starting out that the last thing they’d purchase is a monthly autoresponder service.
If you stop and think about it, there are plenty of bloggers out there setting up their first sites who have read that they need to be gathering email addresses, but aren’t quite sure about it all, and don’t want to commit to a service.
So I looked around to see what was available in the way of AR plugins for us marketers. I expected to find at least one half decent plugin, but to my surprise the one that really looked promising didn’t allow you to gather a name – all you could get was an email address.
Also, the interface was a bit clunky and it meant you had to go to different areas of the WP admin panel to do different things. I wanted it all in one menu area.
And then there was no widget so you could easily place the form in the sidebar like I do on my personal blog. I know that’s very effective, and is important to have in.
There were a couple of other plugins that sort of claimed to do the job, but it was clear they’d all been planned by developers not marketers. Many of them are just simple list mailers and have no kind of delayed autoresponder ability. It seemed that nobody really knew quite what it was that WE needed.
And that’s why I created this plugin.
I fully intend to turn it into a powerful tool that’s a first choice for bloggers, and my pledge is that all minor version releases up to v2 will be free upgrades. I have some great ideas for it as I really know what’s lacking from many autoresponder services – I’ve felt that pain.
So on Friday 30th April at 6.00pm GMT (1.00pm EST), I’ll be kicking off this nickel sale.
***WARNING***
The last nickel sale I did a few months ago went a bit pear shaped as the autoresponder service I was using failed to send out the email until nearly 2 hours after it was supposed to go out. Many people were left waiting for it but didn’t get it until many sales had already gone through, and so didn’t get as good a deal as they would have done.
So my advice is, if you want to be one of the first to grab it and get it at it’s lowest price, keep an eye on my blog.
Regardless of whether or not the email is sent out on time, if you hang around on my blog at start time, you’ll see a post appear with the location of the nickel sale. Okay?
That’s how lots of people got in early last time, and that’s probably how it will happen this time too.
-Frank Haywood
Wow Frank how cool is that finally a WP plug-in autoresponder cant wait to try it, test it, review it and promote it any chance of a early copy.
@Paul Saunders:
Lol! I *may* release it tomorrow to PLR Code Mine members, otherwise Friday it is. 🙂
Hi Frank,
I have been waiting for a long time for the right tool to use on my website, tired of working with code on each and every website I have.
I look forward to your release during you Nickel Sale.
Thanks for your work.
Dave…
Definitely a sorely needed tool. Another great idea Frank! I’ll be buying it for sure. Thanks for the effort!
Hi Frank,
Sounds great. Got one question and that is will the AR be limited to one domain or can it be used on several.
Thanks,
Gary
@Gary Jenkins:
As many domains as you personally own is my usual licencing. You know what? Because people might want to use this on their clients sites, I might also release a licence that allows people to do this – I’ll have a think about it.
Hi Frank,
Sounds so interesting, four questions.
1. Is it double opt in
2. Can you refer the visitor to a specific page.O.T.O. from the opt-in
3. Can you broadcast a newsletter.
4. Will it intergrate with SSmartdd for delivery .
I just signed up with Getresponse for their “first 10 free” offer, then my blog was taken down by a hacker! (no connection implied)
On the face of it your autoresponder sounds like a godsend. I shall hold off upgrading with them till I learn more.
best wishes
Gareth
@Gareth Hogan:
#1 – Not this version, but it’s in the pipleline as a minor release.
#2 – Hmm no, but I can see how that would be a nice to have, so I’ll see if it cant be added in tomorrow in time for Friday.
#3 – Yes. You can store as many AR messages as you like, and also all broadcast emails are saved until you’re ready to (re-)send them. Additionally there’s an email log where all sent messages are stored, and you can re-send those messages out to individual people. This will become more useful when we add a couple more features.
#4 – No, but watch this space.
In this version, you can use either PHP mail send (default) or also SMTP. With SMTP you can then specify a service such as AuthSMTP.com. There are plans to make the SMTP support a lot better, but I don’t want to let the cat out of the bag too soon.
The slant on this first release of the plugin is small niche blogs, but I fully intend to beef it up.
I know some people will say “deliverability”, but this is less of an issue nowadays if you ask your web host (or do it yourself in cPanel) to turn on SPF (and DomainKeys). This adds in extra information to the email headers which improves your chances of the email getting through. And of course if you ask people to whitelist you, that also makes a diference too.
There’s one other thing I’d like to add, and that’s that this first version is intended for niche blogs, so it will only come with just the one mailing list. We’ll add multiple lists ASAP, and I’d also like to see cross-site sign up forms included, ie create a new mailing list and generate a sign up form which could be used on another site – even a non-WordPress site I guess.
I don’t want it to get too big a program with loads of bloat, but there are definitely some useful things that should be included.
Finally, I plan to do some work to beef it all up a bit by adding in some third party support.
Again, I don’t want to let the cat out of the bag at this early stage. 😉
@Gareth Hogan:
It looks like your #2 is in. 😉
Hey Frank – been waiting for this one! I build WordPress Blogs and sell them so can I include this on the blogs I build and sell them?
@colin:
I should have guessed this would happen. I can see I’m going to have to come up with an alternative licencing model for some people aren’t I? 😉
For now, no you can’t (or maybe you can… hmm…), but I’ll see if there’s something I can do about it.
@Frank Haywood: Frank,
As a suggestion, perhaps you could set up a Paypal Donation button so people like Colin could send you some money if they were using the script for uses other than their own web sites.
It seems only fair to me that if I were to do that myself, I would want you to get something in return, especially since your products are so inexpensive. If you were selling them for big bucks, I would feel differently, however, you are a person like the rest of us making a living online and not some huge Internet marketer or big corporation.
Having been involved with non-profit theatres and concerts, we discovered that sometimes you can make more money by asking for donations than by selling tickets.
Donations also let folks give you what they can afford. Ideally, if they are selling their services for lots of money, they would be willing to share more than someone that isn’t making a whole lot for their efforts.
Just some possibilities…
@colin: Colin,
Perhaps you could send Frank some money each time you use the script for one of your clients and charge them for it.
Of course, if the amount is small enough, you might not have to charge them.
Frank, this is going to be the perfect plugin I’ve been waiting for. I won’t make any suggestions for added features until after I use the plugin, if there are any:)
Frank, will this be the April PLR product but without the PLR?
@Michael Pedzotti:
No this is an additional gift to all PLR Code Mine members.
I know it’s late, but Aprils’ product should be available later today. One of the key players involved in the production of the April PLR package disappeared without a word last Friday, otherwise you would have had it a week ago.
If this circumvents a need for Aweber or Getresponse or any other autoresponder, then I definitely want it.
@chuck:
I don’t know if it will ever do away with large services like that, but certainly I think it’s an alternative, especially if you use AuthSMTP. They do the same things in terms of deliverability and I believe that for small niche mailing lists, the combination of their service plus a scripted method of sending mail like this is going to be less expensive in the long run, and also give you more control.
We’d like to see click tracking wouldn’t we? “YES!”
And we’d like to re-mail only those people who didn’t click without it costing us an arm and a leg to be able to do it woudn’t we? “YES!”
That’s where I see this plugin going.
I believe that in the USA we need the double opt-in so we aren’t breaking the law, so I am glad that you will be adding that feature in the future.
I might be able to find a workaround until then, but in any case, i will be buying it since it seems like the perfect addition to WPAP. It is worth getting it at a discount and holding it until I can do a double opt-in.
Stuart
@Stuart Joseph:
I don’t think you do need double opt in in order to comply with US can-spam, but it is something I’ll check out in the future – you should take a look yourself to make sure.
I *believe* and I could be wrong, that you only need a clear method of unsubscribing.
I do agree though that double opt-in (now called Confirmed Opt In) is something we should all use anyway as there can then be no question that the person who requested the emails really owns that email address.
It’s high on the priority list.
this sounds great. I can’t wait. Will you do some training videos, especially with the phpList stuff, that app get’s a bit clunky for me. Cheers.
@Lisa:
I will, but they won’t be available today.
In all seriousness, for this version you probably won’t need videos.
I’ve tried phpList amongst others, and I’ve even written to them telling them what was needed by marketers and they pretty much replied they weren’t going to do it, and never have.
And that’s one of the problems with developers. They just don’t get the way we work, the way we think, and quite often they’re sceptical of what we’re saying. They also don’t understand some of the key issues in mailer software, and its a shame for them.
That’s one of the reasons I finally sat down and sketched out this simple autoresponder / broadcaster.
The way I think and the way I work is I like to see projects pay for themselves ASAP. In fact it’s one of my #1 rules (I have a few #1 rules!) and if something is going to take 3 months to write and a month to test, I won’t start on it.
I like to see results after less than a month otherwise I see it as a waste of time and effort, and I’ve just had to fire someone for spending nearly 4 weeks on a project where they did none of the things I asked for and spent time on stuff I actively didn’t want because it was a bad idea!
(Actually that episode is a very good example of a developer thinking they know better.)
Once a project / product is live and earning money, then I invest some of that money back into making it better.
That’s the right way of approaching it all isn’t it?
This sounds really nice.
I own/use SmartDD v3, and an Imnica Mail account (per your suggestions, on both).
A feature I’d like to see is to have someone who registers to my blog be automatically (optionally) added to my external AR mailing list.
I opened a Mail Chimp account just because a WP plugin does this with Mal Chimp.
Might be a feature to consider here– adding to external AR. Hosting company email limits are very… limited.
Great Work!
–LeeSr
@Lee Szczepanik Sr:
Aha! Watch this space. 😉
I’m very happy to be able to get my hands on that plug in. I’ve not been very dynamic with the word press script + plugins thingy.
I realise what an error that has been from my part.
Anyway it’s time to get that in place and working for me and my people.
G’day from Australia
Want it Frank – but your timing sucks in Australia because it will be 4am on Saturday morning here.
Any chance I can pre-book it?
Dave
@David Foard:
Ah… I know I can’t please everybody. It doesn’t matter what time I choose, I always get somone say it’s no good for them. 😉
It’s the only downside to running a nickel sale.
Look at it this way. If I were like most marketers, I’d open at $17 or $27 and put the price up to $27 or $47 after a few days. Well I *do* put the price up after a few days, but I like to give people a chance to get it at a lower price than would normally be charged, by first running a nickel sale.
It’s sort of a bargain basement price for early movers.
So really any price under $17 is a good one in my books. That’s the way I see it anyway.
And I’ll probably set the price to $27 or more, certainly after I’ve added a few extra features I have planned ASAP.
Is the nickel sale already on?
Frank.
I’m also in Australia. All your dimesales that I have been aware of have started at 3:00 am here.
(I must tell you that I do not like your dimesale script at all. I m looking for a script that will raise the price from the TIME the person comes to the website. For Example: set to raise $1 per hour or 5c per minute etc until it reaches the final price. My script would be fair to all and not create resentful “prospects” or customers. If you get such a script made please let me know :-))
I am intending to buy your WP autoresponder with the understanding that you will have it upgraded to include double-optin. Single optin only is of no use to me.
Thanks Frank, I look forward to the release at 3:00 am.
Wayne.
You don’t have to have the double opt-in. there’s several marketers that advise you to use single optin.
HI, frank,
I wanted to make sure I was one fo the first folks to buy the script, so I followed your suggestion to watch the blog. it is 1:05 PM EST and no location to get the script.
What do I do now?
stuart
Thanks Frank. It’s a few minutes after the hour and I can’t find the nickel sale link?
It’s past 1:00pm EST, where’s the link?
Hi Frank – was that 1 PM Eastern DAYLIGHT time or STANDARD time, because it’s already 1 PM EDT now and I haven’t seen a link yet.
Thanks – can’t wait.
Frank,
I have stayed up until 3:00 am here in Australia but there is no sign of the script at 3:15 (18:15 in the UK)
Wayne.
Hi Frank – was that 1 PM Eastern DAYLIGHT time or STANDARD time, because it’s already 1 PM EDT now and I haven’t seen a link yet.
Thanks – can’t wait.
Hmmm – this blog post is showing after 6 PM (must be your UK time), so that link should be coming out soon.
Hi Frank,
Where is the link? waiting for it!
Arrrrrg – looks like this will be another time-delay snafu, and not come out until 2 PM eDt, which translates to 1 PM eSt. Arrrrg.
Okay, got it.
Thanks Frank!
Now I can sleep!
Wayne.
To Wayne – your idea sounds good, but creates a couple of problems. First, the purpose of a dime sale is to create urgency, and giving someone several hours (or whatever) sort-of defeats the urgency. Second, the script you suggest would have (I think) to be cookie controlled. Unfortunately, all someone has to do is delete their cookies (or just yours) and the timer goes back to the start again. So, a person would literally have as much time as they want with your offer. No urgency at all.
Good luck, and JMO anyway. 🙂
Me too. I looked for it at 2 minutes past 5 (BST – 2 past 6 GMT). Have I missed it?
Frank, Frank
7.22pm and links aren’t working http://plugingreat.com/3dayns/
http://clicks.aweber.com/y/ct/?l=ARzHG&m=1eT3pyruTCHlFP&b=nLux6XtzuOvw66Yp5mSzxA
Hello Frank.
I have installed and activated the plugin.
Instructions needed please!
Wayne.
Hi Frank,
Got it right away and have installed it already. I am getting an error when saving the Autoresponder Settings. If I leave the Affiliate url empty it’s saved with the url: http://www.plugingreat.com and I am getting an error the first time I hit update options.
Rene
Ps: I was planning to submit a support ticket at http://www.vendiva.com/support
but there is no WP autoresponder options to choose from the list.
Frank,
Are there any instructions to accompany this plugin? I haven’t got a clue what to do with it!
Thx.
~cj
Hi Frank
I have a small problem.
I have uploaded the files to the pluging dir, and activated the autoresponder.
I have tried to test but met with this message……
The name you have entered in already in the database. Please try using different name!
Also same message on your domain
There are no users in the database at all.
I ave also re downloaded and read the PDF to install, so i tried to upload via WP plugins and it gave me an error …..
error headers.
So i deleted and uploaded the zip to the site, then extracted it.
Still have same problem with subscribers.
http://marketingmoneymachine.co.uk/x/ is where i have installed the blog
Please help
FTP and WP login can be supplied.
Regards
Mike
PS i have tried to contact you via Support but everytime i enter the captchas code it tells me its wrong
Mike: You should find that’s been fixed now. 🙂
Hello Frank, is very cool woow,thanks for infomation.Best Regards Stephan