When someone signs up to get your free offer you’ll want to provide them with the download (or give them more information if it’s a challenge) and welcome them to your world. This is done with a welcome sequence. Since MailerLite is one of the most popular email marketing platforms I thought I would walk you through creating the welcome sequence using MailerLite.
You can find out if MailerLite is the right platform for you in this post.
Use a form or a landing page for people to sign up
The simplest ways to collect email addresses with MailerLite are to use a form or a landing page. You can embed the form on your website. Or you can use a standalone landing page. You can also use forms built into your website to collect email addresses.
To create a form in MailerLite …
To create a form in MailerLite go to Forms. If you want the form embedded in your website choose embedded forms, then click on Create embedded form to create a new form. Or if you want a pop up, then choose pop ups.
To use the method I’m showing you’ll want to make this form a single opt in. If you want to use double opt in you’ll need to make sure the confirmation email is complete.
Either way you’ll follow the instructions, then choose embed code to get the code to embed it on your website.
To create a landing page in MailerLite …
If you want to have a stand alone page that you send people to you’ll probably want to create a landing page. You can use different tools and even turn your form into a simple landing page by adding a background to your form page and using the URL they provide as your landing page.
However if you want more flexibility in your landing page you’ll want to create one using MailerLite sites. I’ll go over all the details of creating a landing page in another blog post. But I’ll get you started here.
Click on the Sites tab, then click create landing page. Give your page a name, then you’ll need to select the subscriber group.
Use a group to identify people
MailerLite uses groups in much the same way other email platforms use tags. You will have selected or created a new group to add people to in the previous step. A group will be the basis of your next step. You can create multiple groups and people can belong to more than one group.
This is useful for starting your automation and if you want to send targeted emails if you have more than one opt in or product.
Create an automation
Now that you have the group set up, you are finally ready to create your welcome sequence automation.
You do have the option of adding an automation directly to a form or landing page, but I find creating it separately gives you a few more options.
Start by clicking on the Automation tab, then clicking Create workflow. Give your workflow a name (don’t worry you can change it later) and select your trigger. For your landing page automation you either want to use joins a group or completes a form as your trigger.
Next you’ll either select the form or group. You’ll want to check the repeat workflow box, if you want someone to recieve the same sequence if they sign up again.
You’ll now see that a workflow has been created wtih the group or form you chose, but your workflow is not completed. Click the plus sign to add the first email.
First email should include a link to the download
Click the email button under Add a next step. Here is where you’ll create the first (welcome email). After you’ve added the Email name (for your use) and subject, your name and email under Who is it from you’ll click on the Design email content button to create this email.
Here you’ll see some options for creating your email. You can choose from templates you’ve created, MailerLite templates and recent emails. Or you can create a new email from scratch.
Now you are given another choice. On how to create your email. To make things easy, choose the drag and drop editor. Here MailerLite provides a template for you that is not really that useful for a welcome email.
You can replace the logo at the top with your own, then delete the rest of the blocks, except for the footer which should be populated with your information.
We want to keep this first email simple so you will just want to add a text block. Once the text block is added you can create your email. In the first email you’ll want to include the link to the download. MailerLite does not provide storage for this content, so you’ll need to store it somewhere else. Check out this blog post for places you can store your free download.
Almost ready
After the first email is created your welcome automation is technically ready to go. Once it’s turned on, anyone who signs up will receive the email with the free guide.
Now is a good time to test it. Once you’ve turned on the automation, you can sign up using your form or landing page.
More emails
I did say this was a welcome sequence so let’s add some more emails. Start by adding a delay. Hit the plus button and then delay. Choose the amount of time you want to wait before sending the next email.
Then you can create another email using the same steps as for the first email. This time you can select recent emails and make a copy of the first one, so the formatting is already there.
Keep adding delays and emails for as many emails that you want in the sequence.
Finishing touches
Congratulations! You’ve created a basic welcome sequence with MailerLite. You can stop here if you like or you can add a few finishing touches.
If you currently send weekly emails to your list, you might want to keep the new subscribers off your main newsletter list until they have completed the welcome sequence. This means that someone isn’t going to get a random email in the middle of the sequence that doesn’t really go with the sequence.
There are a few ways to do this. The simplest is to create a group called newsletter. At the end of your welcome sequence you’ll use an action to copy people into the newsletter group.
If you have more than one free offer you can either create a separate welcome series for each or you can keep you welcome series short and then add everyone to a single sequence after they have received their free offer.
Summary
Creating a welcome sequence is an important part of your wellness business email marketing. It helps you to turn subscribers into clients. If you are looking for help setting up your email marketing platform, I can help. Click the link below to book a free strategy session.