Friday, May 18, 2007

Internet MLM: Getting Started with the AWeber auto responder


As you know I am very committed to building my Network Marketing Business (aka MLM) on the Internet.

I hate the rejection factor and the incredible time inefficiency of the warm market building process. Let's face it, the internet has arrived and it ain't going away, so let's make it work for us.

But as we all discover--unless you're already an internet Guru--there are a few hurdles to be overcome first.

And right now, top of my list has been finding my way around AWeber, the auto responder I have decided to move to for my opt-in lists.

All of these online services advertise how easy it is to use their site, but I have to tell you that it just never seems to work that way for me. I find their documentation to be hopelessly inadequate and the sites way less than intuitive. It's not just AWeber; it's most of them. And I am pretty savvy around computers and the internet.

Let's just deal with one component of setting up your AWeber auto responder--using personalized salutations in your email messages--e.g. Hi Mary or Dear John etc.

How exactly are we going to set this up.

Well I am finally able to report that it's very easy if you just use the opt-in webform creation tool exactly as they set it out for you.


That sounds pretty smart and straight forward, right? Well not exactly; and here's where I got confused. AWeber sent me a tutorial indicating that personalizing messages using "first name" has way better opening rates than using the persons "full name". And I know that I feel way less threatened by a form that only asks for my first name and email.

But here's the thing! The default option when you set up your opt-in form is "email" and then "name". So people who see name in the form will enter either their first name or their "full name". Besides not pulling as well , using the full name in the salutation, such as "Hi John Smith" looks pretty tacky.

I found that when I tried to use a "custom field" to request just "first name" only, that I ran into all sorts of conflicts and it wasn't capturing the name at all. Totally my fault I'm sure in how I set it up, but just way too confusing for a beginner.

The good news is that there's a trick which isn't explained anywhere that I can find--but please let me know if it is there somewhere.

And here's the trick: the opt-in form will capture whatever name is entered in the field. Then when you want to enter a personalization field into your email e.g. "Dear first-name" you simply use the drop down list and select "first name fix". Sounds logical right?

But here's the bit that isn't explained!

This field will go and capture just the first word in the name field and return that as the name for your email. It will ignore the rest of the name. As well as that using the "fix" variable in the field, the software will automatically capitalize the first letter of the name for you.

Problem solved.

I hope this is clear. I spent a lot of frustrated time and energy getting to this place.

Seems simple I know. Am I the only one who runs across challenges like this?

Keep on winning

Best Regards

Jim

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Jim Keayes is an expert Internet Marketer. Over more than 20
years he has taught many people the strategies to accumulate
and leverage wealth. You can subscribe to his “Free
Newsletter” by visiting his website at:
http://www.homebasedbusinessontheweb.com/OptIn3SurefireWays/
or by emailing jim@hbbontheweb.com
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