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I remember sitting in my digital marketing class my senior year of college thinking to myeself, “why are we learning about email marketing? Emails are dead. Obviously social media is where it’s at (insert face palm emoji)”
Man, oh, man was I wrong.
Fast forward a couple of years later, I’m realizing how lucky I was to learn about email marketing. And how not dead email marketing truly is.
In fact, it’s estimated that one email list subscriber will equal $1/month on average (you can learn more about this from Jenna Kutcher here!)
And while email marketing is very much still alive, the increased knowledge about this type of marketing has made it slightly harder to grow and thrive from your list. For instance, it is no longer enough to just say “Sign up for my list” as consumers and potential clients have gotten more protective over their inboxes.
But don’t fret! There are so many tools out there that can help you build and engage with your email list. Today, I want to share more on one of my personal favorites – Flodesk!
Before we dive in – if you’d like to test Flodesk for free and get 50% off your first year, sign up here!*
In today’s post, I’ll share how you can easily get started with email marketing workflows using Flodesk!
Workflows vs one off emails
Since today’s blog post will be all about how you can set up your workflows in Flodesk, I figured it would be helpful to start off the whole post with a little introduction to the difference between workflows and one off emails.
Simply put, workflows send out automatically while one off emails are set up individually before sending out, more like a newsletter.
Workflows are particularly helpful when it comes to delivering opt-in freebies or lead magnets, but can also be used for e-courses (like our free 5 Day Pinterest course) or welcome sequences providing new subscribers a warm welcome into the world of your brand and business!
Setting up workflows in Flodesk
For the sake of this tutorial, let’s pretend that we are setting up an email sequence to deliver a freebie and introduce ourselves (and our business) a couple of days later!
We want all of this to be automated, so that new subscribers who find our super helpful freebie can sign up and get it delivered to their inbox immediately, followed by a little Hey, remember me? Introduction email a couple of days later.
Before diving in to Flodesk, make sure that you have your freebie PDF created. If you’d like to learn more about email marketing freebies, The Ultimate Guide to Email Marketing for the Creative Entrepreneur blog post can fill you in!
Create email template
The first thing I like to do when setting up workflows in Flodesk is creating an email template. While I could create the email directly in the workflow, I found that creating them in the main email section allows me to reuse the same template for future workflows, and I’m all about saving time down the road!
In Flodesk, in the emails tab, create a new email by clicking on the “Create new” button in the top right corner.
Choose a template or start your design from scratch – I personally love the deliver your freebie template, and I think it’s a great place to start!
Click on the template you want, and start customizing!
As you’re designing your email template, pay attention to the following:
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Email colors – the template has colors, but change them up to fit your brand!
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Email wording – does the template use words you wouldn’t normally say? Change them! Part of the genius here is the ability to be authentic.
Once you’re done customizing your email, click “Next” in the top right corner, and then click the Flodesk logo. This will save your email as a draft inside your emails tab – which is exactly what we want!
Since we are setting up a workflow with two emails – one to deliver the freebie and a second email to introduce ourselves, repeat the process above for the introduction email. For this one, I think the Jenna Kutcher Welcome New Subscribers template is a great starting point.
Again, don’t forget to change out the language and brand colors, after all, this email should be an introduction to you and your brand!
Create your segment
For Flodesk to know where these subscribers belong, and what workflow to associate them with, we need to create a segment.
Segments are basically groups for your subscribers, in this case based on the freebie they signed up
for.
To set up your segment:
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Hover over the “Audience” tab and select “Segments”
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Click the “Add Segments” button
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Name your segment – I prefer to name mine with the name of the freebie (for instance, 5 Day Pinterest Challenge)
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Click “Save”
Now that we have our email templates designed and our segment created, we’re ready to set it all up in a workflow!
Setting up your workflow
Now that we have all the components of the workflow created, this part becomes super easy!
To set up your workflow, do the following:
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Open the workflow tab, by clicking on “Workflows” in your Flodesk menu.
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Click “Create New”
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While you definitely can start your workflow from a template, I actually prefer to set mine up from scratch. On the left hand side, select “Start from scratch”
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You’ll be asked to create a name for your workflow. Again, I prefer to name them something similar to the freebie, just to make my life a little easier down the road.
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Add a trigger – this is what actually starts the workflow. For us, this will be when someone is added to the segment we just created.
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Click “Add trigger’
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Then choose “A subscriber is added to a segment” in the drop down menu on the right
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Then, select the segment you’d like.
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Click save
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Now click the + icon below the trigger, and select email!
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Click “Use existing email” and find the deliver your freebie template we created earlier in this tutorial. P.S. make sure your button is connected to the freebie, either by uploading the freebie to your website (tutorial on that here) or by uploading the freebie directly to Flodesk.
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Decide on your subject line and email preview text, then click save!
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Next, click the + icon again, this time choosing the “Time delay” option. Set your time delay to 3 days and click save.
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Now, we’ll add that second email we wrote, all about introducing ourselves. Again, click the + icon, select email, choose the template we created (double check to make sure it looks exactly the way you’d like it to), then set your subject line and preview text.
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Once your workflow is all done, click “Next” in the top right corner and select “Publish now”
And just like that, you have your very own opt-in freebie delivery workflow set up!
But wait. How do people actually sign up for this?
Great question, my friend! We need to have a form set up on our website that allows people to sign up for this workflow.
Setting up forms in Flodesk:
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Head to your “Forms” tab and click “Create new”
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Choose the type of form that you would like to set up. If you’re not sure, Michele Perry has some great tutorials on her YouTube page here.
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Select the segment that you would like the subscribers to be added to. This is the same segment we’ve been using for this entire tutorial, and this is the step that really ties it all together!
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Create your form
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Using the embed code, place the form on your website for your visitors to sign up! Not sure how to do this part? This Flodesk tutorial will walk you through the steps!
And just like that, you’re ready to grow your email list in your sleep (literally).
Do you want to test out Flodesk? Use this link to test it out for free for 30 days & get 50% off your first year!
Looking for help with all this tech stuff? I’m a Squarespace and Showit web designer, and I’d love to work with you to set up the website of your dreams & get your email marketing off to a great start with Flodesk! Learn more about the web design services below!
