iWeb for Musicians
Contact Forms and Email
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Forms are a great way to “capture” email addresses so that you can make up a mailing list and bulk mail your fans and customers with news, new releases and buyer incentives.
Most of us are reluctant to give out or address unless there is a good reason.
You need to give people an incentive to fill in your form. This could be a “free” gift, a discount on their first order or, as I do, offer free E Books.
To be able to set up this form you need a web host that handles form mail. Most servers have this function with the exception of MobileMe which you won’t be using anyway - will you?
MobileMe users can use the form services at the bottom of this page.
The images are screenshots of contact forms built using a code similar to the one used for the contact form on the landing page of this site.
The forms are implemented by modifying a PHP script and uploading it to your server.
To get the results from the form, an email address is set up in your server control panel.
Web server email is not the most convenient place to to read your email. When I set up a new website, I open a Gmail account for it.
For iWeb for Musicians, this is - iwebformusicians@gmail.com
This is set up as a new account in my Mac Mail so that I can answer emails as I work.
A tutorial is included in the iWeb for Musicians Tutorial EBook and the contents of this are shown in the image to the right.
MobileMe
For those of you who want to stick with the Apple server you have to realize that, along with all its other “missing” features, it doesn’t have the capability to handle forms and all the other exciting stuff that a commercial hosting company provides.
You can have forms by using services that will handle your redirects for free if you carry their advertising or you can pay them for a more professional look. A couple of examples are....
Website Contact Forms and Web Server Email
Bulk Emailing
For bulk emailing I use the application SerialMailer which will import a group from your Address Book into its data base. The application is easy to use and hyperlinks are set by using the formatted text option.
Serial Mailer can be set to send your emails in bursts with a time interval between them so that your internet connection doesn't get bogged down.
Click the icon for more information.
SerialMailer
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If you can’t justify the cost of SerialMailer, try this freeware...... http://www.freemacware.com/serial-mail/
Copyright © Roddy McKay - 2009 - All Rights Reserved
Find out about EBlasting ........ http://www.iwebformusicians.com/PromoPage/EBlast.html
If you don’t want to get into all the hassles of form building you can use a service like GetResponse.
The movie is about using their form builder.
Two excellent services that are free to some extent are:
MAD MIMI - http://madmimi.com/
MAIL CHIMP - http://www.mailchimp.com/
Email Me
This is the new Snow Leopard Email Me Button.......
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