“Follow Up Email”
User Guide
Version: 3.4
Website: http://ecommerce.aheadworks.com
Support: [email protected]
Copyright (c) 2008-2012 aheadWorks Co. www.aheadworks.com
Follow Up Email User Guide 2
Table of Contents “Follow Up Email” User Guide .............................................................................................................. 1
Table of Contents ................................................................................................................................... 2
1. Introducing Follow Up Email ............................................................................................................. 3
2. Follow Up Email Configuration .......................................................................................................... 4
3. Follow Up Email Template Creating .................................................................................................. 5
Newsletter Template ................................................................................................................................................. 5
Transactional Email Template .................................................................................................................................. 6
4. Follow Up Rules Managing ................................................................................................................ 7
5. Follow Up Email Variables ............................................................................................................... 16
6. Examples of Follow Up Emails Creating ......................................................................................... 18
Customer last activity .............................................................................................................................................. 18
New Template Creation ...................................................................................................................................... 18
New Rule Creation .............................................................................................................................................. 19
Customer’s birthday ................................................................................................................................................ 24
New Template Creation ...................................................................................................................................... 24
New Rule Creation .............................................................................................................................................. 25
New abandoned cart appeared .............................................................................................................................. 30
New Templates Creation .................................................................................................................................... 30
New Rule Creation .............................................................................................................................................. 33
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Follow Up Email User Guide 3
1. Introducing Follow Up Email
Looking for greater interaction with your customers for your e-commerce website? Follow Up Email is a
powerful auto-responder and customer relationship tool that helps to keep your site in the customer's mind always.
Use this automated email follow-up extension and you'll never lose track of your customers even if they have
abandoned their shopping carts.
In today's fiercely competitive business environment, a caring attitude towards customers can go a long way in
creating a delightful experience for your customer. The aheadWorks Follow Up Email extension is an
indispensable tool to help you stay in close touch with your customers.
Enjoy these irresistible benefits that the powerful features of Follow Up Email give to your ecommerce website.
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Follow Up Email User Guide 4
2. Follow Up Email Configuration The following describes how to configure the Follow Up Email extension.
1. Go to the System → Configuration → aheadWorks Extensions → Follow Up Email or Follow Up
Email → Settings backend page.
2. In the Sender field, select the emails sender which will be used in the “From” field of follow-up emails. In this
dropdown list the contacts from the System → Configuration → General → Store Emails Addresses
configuration page is taken.
3. In the Enable logging field, select Yes. It means that there will be created a special file with all information
about follow-up emails – date and time of their creation; date, time and email address your follow-up emails
will be send at; who and when deleted or cancelled emails sending. To view this information go to var/log/ and
open the folowupemail_cron.log file.
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Follow Up Email User Guide 5
3. Follow Up Email Template Creating After the extension configuration, you should create a required template (for example, with a notification about
abandoned cart and a link to restore it), and only then create a rule where you will specify this template. Thus when
the action corresponding to the rule conditions is carried out (a customer abandons his/her cart), the follow-up
email with the information specified in template is sent.
There are two template types in Magento – Newsletter template and Transactional email template. Newsletter
templates are used to send newsletters to customers; Transactional email templates are used to send emails from a
Magento store. Follow Up Email works with both of them. You can choose any of these template types according
to your preferences.
Newsletter Template The following describes how to create a Newsletter template.
1. Go to the Newsletter → Newsletter Templates page at the backend.
2. Click the Add New Template button.
3. Specify this template name.
4. Define the subject of the template.
5. Specify the name and email of the follow-up emails sender for this template.
Note: the values of these fields can be overridden by the follow-up email rule settings. For more details see
page 7.
6. In the Template Content field, enter the email text using the HTML code. You can use the predefined
variables as well (the whole list of variables and examples of their applying see on pages 16-17).
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Follow Up Email User Guide 6
Transactional Email Template The following describes how to create a Transactional email template.
1. Go to the System → Transactional Emails page at the backend.
2. Click the Add New Template button.
3. Leave the Template field empty.
4. Specify this template name.
5. Define the subject of the template.
6. In the Template Content field, enter the email text using the HTML code. You can use the predefined
variables as well (the whole list of variables and examples of their applying see on pages 16-17).
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Follow Up Email User Guide 7
4. Follow Up Rules Managing The Follow Up Email extension possesses easy-to-use functionality. The variety of flexible settings allows you to
configure rules according to any requirements. In this section, you will find the detailed description how to do it
properly.
So, to create a new rule:
1. Go to the Follow Up Email → Manage Rules page at the backend.
2. Click the Add Rule button.
General
1. In the Title field, enter the rule title.
2. In the Status field, specify the rule status – Enabled or Disabled.
3. In the Event field, select the event which will cause the rule applying and email sending.
Note: the “New abandoned cart appear” event works for all carts which were abandoned after the
installation of the extension.
There is no ability to send emails to those customers who abandoned their carts before the installation of the
Follow Up Email extension.
4. In the Cancellation events field, select the event(s) which will cancel email sending.
Note: after the Event occurred, the email is created in Mail Log, but after the Cancellation event took place,
the email status is changed to Cancelled and it won’t be sent.
5. In the Customer groups field, select the group(s) of customers the rule will be applied to.
6. In the SKU field, specify the product SKU(s) the rule will be applied to. Please, separate SKUs by commas.
7. In the Sale amount field, select the condition and specify the sale amount when the rule will be applied.
8. In the Email chain field, click the Add email button.
a. In the Send field, specify the period type your email will be sent – After or Before.
b. Define the exact period the email will be send – Days, Hours and Minutes.
c. In the Template field, select the template for your follow-up email.
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Stores & Product Types
1. In the Store View field, select store(s) where the rule will be applied.
2. In the Product type field, select product type(s) which will cause the rule applying.
Note: if you specify the SKU of the product which belongs to the different product type specified in this field,
the rule won’t be applied.
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Excluded Categories
1. Select the Excluded Categories tab on the left.
2. Tick off the categories you do NOT want the rule to be applied in.
Newsletter Subscribers
1. Specify whether to send follow-up email after this rule triggering only to newsletter subscribers or not.
2. If you have installed Advanced Newsletter extension by aheadWorks, you can select a group (segment) of
customers who will receive follow-up email after this rule triggering.
Note: the difference between native Magento groups and Advanced Newsletter segments is that segmenting
criteria can be based on any point you wish – customers’ residence, gender, activity, etc.
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Send Copy
1. Select the Send Copy tab on the left.
2. In the Send copy to email field, specify the email address you want the copy of the follow-up email to be send.
You can enter several emails separated by spaces, commas or semicolons.
Sender Details
1. In the Sender name field, enter the name of the follow-up email sender.
2. In the Sender email field, specify the email of the follow-up email sender.
Note: if you leave these fields empty, the sender data will be taken from Newsletter Template or Follow Up
Email Configuration settings (for Transactional Email Template).
The data from this tab will override sender information from the Newsletter Templates.
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Coupons
1. Specify whether to use coupons for this rule or not.
2. In the Shopping Cart Price Rule field, select the price rule for coupon to be sent.
3. Fill in the Coupon Code Prefix field with the prefix of coupon you want to be sent.
4. In the Coupon expires after, days field specify the number of days after which a coupon will expire, or leave
the field empty for the permanent coupon.
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Send Test Email
1. In the Test recipient field, specify the email address for the test email to be sent to.
2. In the Test object Ids tab, you can specify object information to check the proper template work.
To send test email click the Save And Send Test Email button. To preview it go to the Follow Up Email → Mail
log page at the backend.
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Follow Up Email User Guide 14
Market Segmentation Suite
In the Validate the block by MSS rule field, select the MSS rule created beforehand. Your follow-up emails will
be sent automatically to customers when, for example:
total sales amount of the products in cart equals or greater than $1000
T-Shirt from Dolce & Gabbana for $395 is added to wishlist
HTC Touch Diamond is in the abandoned cart
and so on
Note: this tab is active if the Market Segmentation Suite aheadWorks extension is installed only.
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Google Analytics
1. In the Campaign Source field, use utm_source to identify a search engine, newsletter name, or other
source. For example, utm_source=google
2. In the Campaign Medium field, use utm_medium to identify a medium such as email cost-per-click, banner or
the other. For example, utm_medium=cpc
3. The Campaign Term field is used for paid search. Specify the utm_term to note the keywords for this ad. For
example, utm_term=running+shoes
4. The Campaign Content field is used for A/B testing and content-targeted ads. Fill in this field
with utm_content to differentiate ads or links that point to the same URL. For example, utm_content=logolink
5. A content of the Campaign Name field is used for keyword analysis. Use utm_campaign to identify a specific
product promotion or strategic campaign. For example, utm_campaign=spring_sale
Note: to use this feature, Google Analytics should be configured and activated.
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Follow Up Email User Guide 16
5. Follow Up Email Variables The Follow Up Email extension allows you to use a number of pre-defined variables in your templates:
Variable Name Meaning Example of usage
customer_name Customer full name, if he/she is registered, or a
part of email address before @, or 'Friend' Dear {{var customer_name}}!
customer_firstname Customer first name, works correct for both -
registered and not registered customers Dear {{var customer_firstname}}!
customer_email Customer email
If you’d like to unsubscribe the email
{{var customer_email}}, please click
here
security_code
The security code used to authenticate the
customer when he/she comes back by link from
the email sent
sequence_number
The number of the email in the chain sequence.
When the rule is triggered, the email chain is
sorted by its Send After Days field, and the
sequence_number contains the sequence number
of the email in the chain.
This is {{var sequence_number}}
email we’ve sent you
time_delay The synonym of the Send After Days in the
chain.
time_delay_text
The detailed, 'human-like' text representation of
the time_delay variable.
time_delay result
time_delay >=1 in time_delay
day(s)
1/24<=time_delay<1 in time_delay*24
hour(s)
1/24/60<=time_delay
<1/24
in
time_delay*24*60
minute(s)
time_delay<=1/24/60 right after
All suffixes are configurable by
AW_Followupemail.csv locale file located in
app/locale/selected_language.
time_delay result
12 in 12 days
1 in 1 day
0.5 in 12 hours
0.0416 in 1 hour
0.0208 in 30 minutes
0.000694 in 1 minute
0.0005 right after
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Follow Up Email User Guide 17
time_delay_absolute
The same as time_delay, but for 'Customer
birthday' rule. If email has to be sent before a
customer birthday happens - the value of the
Send After Days field should be negative. The
time_delay_absolute variable contains the
absolute value of the field.
Let us congratulate you on your
birthday that will happen after {{var
time_delay_absolute}} days
url_unsubscribe The link to unsubscribe
You can <a href=”{{var
url_unsubscribe}}”>unsubscribe
here</a>
url_resume The link to resume customer session
You may insert the link for restoring
abandoned cart this way:
<a href=”{{var url_resume}}”>Restore
my cart</a>
This URL leads directly to the Cart
page.
The following URL lead customer to
the Checkout page:
<a href=”{{var
url_resume}}goto/checkout/”>Restore
my cart</a>
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Follow Up Email User Guide 18
6. Examples of Follow Up Emails Creating
The Follow Up Email extension offers you a wide range of events – new customer signup, customer logged in,
customer last activity, customer birthday, new abandoned cart appeared and many others – which can cause the
follow-up email sending in a specified period of time. The chapters below describe in details how to make the
follow-up emails automatically send after some customer’s actions.
Customer last activity The Follow Up Email extension allows you to send customers who haven’t visited your store for a certain period of
time a follow-up email reminding of their accounts in your store and giving a link to invite your store once again.
The following describes how to create a corresponding template and rule and send test email to check the
correctness of template applying.
New Template Creation
1. Go to the Newsletter → Newsletter Templates page at the backend.
2. Click the Add New Template button.
3. Specify this template name.
4. Define the subject of the template.
5. Define the name and email of the follow-up email sender.
6. In the Template Content field, enter the email text using the HTML code. You can use the predefined
variables as well (the whole list of variables and examples of their applying see on pages 16-17).
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Follow Up Email User Guide 19
New Rule Creation
Now let’s create a new rule, specify the template we just added and send test email to make sure that the template
works properly.
1. Go to the Follow Up Email → Manage Rules page at the backend.
2. Click the Add Rule button.
General
1. In the Title field, enter the rule title.
2. In the Status field, set Enabled.
3. In the Event field, select the Customer last activity event.
4. In the Cancellation events field, select Customer logged in as there is no sense to send the email with an
account reminder if the customer has already visited your store.
5. In the Customer groups field, select the group(s) of customers the rule will be applied to.
6. In the SKU field, specify the product SKU(s) the rule will be applied to. Please, separate SKUs by commas.
7. In the Email chain field, click the Add email button.
a. In the Send field, specify the period type your email will be sent – After or Before.
b. Define the exact period the email will be send – Days, Hours and Minutes.
c. In the Template field, select the follow-up email template you have just created.
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Follow Up Email User Guide 20
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Stores & Product Types
1. Select the store(s) you want the rule to be applied at.
Sender Details
1. In the Sender name field, enter the name of the follow-up email sender.
2. In the Sender email field, specify the email address of the follow-up email sender.
Note: the data given in this tab will override sender information from the Newsletter Template.
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Send Test Email
1. In the Test recipient field, specify the email for the test email to be sent to. We have entered different Sender
and Test recipient emails intentionally to check the proper extension and template work.
2. In the Customer email field, specify the customer email. You can specify any other test objects IDs or leave
these fields empty but in this example we want to check the work of customer_name variable from the
template.
After sending our test email (as well as all other emails created after rule triggering) it can be found in the Follow
Up Email → Mail log page in the backend.
In the From field we can see the Sender name and address we specified in the Sender details tab in the Rule
Information page (page 21).
In the To field we can see test customer’s name – john – and the email recipient’s address –
[email protected]. A part of the email before @ from the Customer email field of the Send Test Email
tab was taken as customer’s name. The address was taken from the Test recipient field of the same tab.
The BCC field is empty as we left Send copy to email field of the Rule Information page empty.
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The Subject of the mail is Membership account. It is the exact point specified in the Template Subject field of
the Newsletter Template (page 18).
The text defined in the Template Content field of the Newsletter Template (page 18) is properly displayed in the
Content field. The customer_name variable has been correctly applied – the name was taken by the same way as in
the To field (see above).
The final conclusion: the template and all the data have been correctly applied.
Note: you can cancel, delete or send the email from the Follow Up Email → Mail log page.
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Follow Up Email User Guide 24
Customer’s birthday To congratulate customers with their birthday is the best way to show them careful attitude. The Follow Up Email
extension allows you to configure the greeting email to be automatically sent on the very birthday.
The following describes how to create a new template, set up the rule and send a test email to check the proper
template applying.
New Template Creation
1. Go to the System → Transactional Emails page at the backend.
2. Click the Add New Template button.
3. Specify this template name.
4. Define the subject of the template.
5. In the Template Content field, enter the email text using the HTML code. You can use the predefined
variables as well (the whole list of variables and examples of their applying see on pages 16-17).
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Follow Up Email User Guide 25
New Rule Creation
1. Go to the Follow Up Email → Manage Rules page at the backend.
2. Click the Add Rule button.
Details Tab
1. In the Title field, enter the rule title.
2. In the Status field, set Enabled.
3. In the Event field, select the Customer birthday event.
4. In the Customer groups field, select the group(s) of customers the rule will be applied to.
5. In the Email chain field, click the Add email button.
a. In the Send field, specify the period type your email will be sent – After or Before.
b. Define the number of days the email will be send.
c. In the Template field, select the template you have just created.
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Follow Up Email User Guide 26
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Stores & Product Types Tab
1. Select the store(s) you want the rule to be applied at.
Sender Details
1. In the Sender name field, enter the name of the follow-up email sender.
2. In the Sender email field, specify the email of the follow-up email sender.
Note: if you leave these fileds empty the sender information will be taken from the Sender field of the Follow
Up Email Configuration page.
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Send Test Email
1. In the Test recipient field, specify the email for the test email to be sent to. We have entered different Sender
and Test recipient emails intentionally to check the proper extension and template work.
2. In the Customer email field, specify the customer email. You can specify any other test objects IDs or leave
these fields empty but in this example we want to check the work of customer_name variable.
After sending test email (as well as all other emails created after rule triggering) it can be found in the Follow Up
Email → Mail log in the backend.
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Follow Up Email User Guide 29
In the From field, we can see the Sender name and address we specified in the Sender Details tab in the Rule
Information page (page 27).
In the To field, we can see test customer’s name – barbara – and the email recipient’s address –
[email protected]. A part of the email before @ from the Customer email field of the Send Test Email
tab was taken as customer’s name. The address was taken from the Test recipient field of the same tab.
The BCC field is empty as we left Send copy to email field of the Rule Information page empty.
The Subject of the mail is Happy Birthday. It is the exact point specified in the Template Subject field of the
Transactional Email Template (page 24).
The text defined in the Template Content field of the Transactional Email Template (page 24) is displayed in the
Content field. The customer_name variable has been correctly applied – the name was taken by the same way as in
the To field (see above). The image is also displayed properly.
The final conclusion: the template and all the data have been correctly applied.
Note: you can cancel, delete or send the email from the Follow Up Email → Mail log page.
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New abandoned cart appeared The Follow Up Email extension allows you to send an email reminding your customers of their abandoned carts.
The chapters below describe how to create a template where all information about products from the cart –title,
image, description, price and anything else you wish – will be defined; how to make the rule to send follow-up
email in a specified period of time after the cart was abandoned; how to check the proper template work.
New Templates Creation
In our example we want to display the complete information about products from the abandoned cart. That’s why
we should create 2 templates – in the first one we specify the HTML code for the whole email, in the second – the
code which will represent detailed information about each product from the abandoned cart for the first template.
The first template will referrer the second.
Let’s create the first template with the HTML code for the whole email. The products from the abandoned cart will
be displayed in the table.
1. Go to the Newsletter → Newsletter Templates page at the backend.
2. Click the Add New Template button.
3. In the Template Name field, specify a name for this template – Abandoned cart.
4. Define the subject of the template.
5. Specify the sender name and email.
6. In the Template Content field, we should enter the HTML code for the follow-up email. Let’s copy it from the
ready template.
a. Go to app/code/local/AW/Followupemail/sql/followupemail_setup
b. Open the templates.xml file
c. Find the following line:
<template_code>AW Your cart has been abandoned</template_code>
d. Copy the HTML code below this line enclosed in the <template_text> </template_text> tags and paste
it in the Template Content field.
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Now we should create one more template which will help the first template to represent the information about
products from the abandoned cart in appropriate row of the products table.
1. Click the Add New Template button in the Newsletter Templates page.
2. In the Template Name field, specify a name for this template – Abandoned cart row.
Note: the template name must be the same as in the line from the first template.
3. Define the subject of the template.
4. Specify the sender name and email – the values are not essential here as they are not taken for the follow-up
email.
5. Open the same templates.xml file and find the line:
<template_code>AW Abandoned cart row</template_code>
Copy the HTML code below this line enclosed in the <template_text> </template_text> tags and paste it in the
Template Content field without any changes.
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New Rule Creation
1. Go to the Follow Up Email → Manage Rules page at the backend.
2. Click the Add Rule button.
General
1. In the Title field, enter the rule title. Let’s name it Abandoned cart not to get confused when we’ll create
several rules.
2. In the Status field, set Enabled.
3. In the Event field, select the New abandoned cart appeared event.
4. In the Cancellation events field, select Customer logged in.
5. In the Customer groups field, select the group(s) of customers the rule will be applied to.
6. In the Sale amount field, select the condition and specify the amount when the rule will be applied.
7. In the Email chain field, click the Add email button.
a. In the Send field, specify the period type your email will be sent – After or Before.
b. Define the exact period the email will be send – Days, Hours and Minutes.
c. In the Template field, select the first email template – Abandoned cart.
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Stores & Product Types
1. Select the store(s) you want the rule to be applied at.
2. Select the type(s) of the product put in the abandoned cart for the rule to be applied.
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Sender Details
1. Select the Sender Details tab on the left.
2. In the Sender name field, enter the name of the follow-up email sender.
3. In the Sender email field, specify the email of the follow-up email sender.
Note: the data given in the Sender details tab will override sender information from the Newsletter templates.
Now you should check the correctness of template work. Create an account in your store, add products to cart (in
our case the total amount has to be greater than $500 for the rule to be applied) and log out.
1. Go to the Follow Up Email → Manage Rules page at the backend.
2. Click the Edit button of the Abandoned cart rule.
3. Click the Send Test Email tab.
4. In the Test recipient field, specify the email for the test email to be sent to.
5. In the Customer ID field, enter the ID of the customer you have just created (Customers → Manage
Customers).
6. Click the Save And Send Test Email button.
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To view the email, go to the Follow Up Email → Mail log backend page.
In the From field, we can see the Sender name and address specified in the Sender Details tab in the Rule
Information page (page 37).
In the To field, we can see customer’s name – John Smith – and the email recipient’s address –
[email protected]. The information is correct.
The BCC field is empty as we left Send copy to email field of the Rule Information page empty.
The Subject of the mail is Your cart was abandoned. It is the exact point specified in the Template Subject field
of the Newsletter Email Template.
In the Content field, we can see that both templates have been applied correctly – the customer name is right and
the table is filled with proper information.
The final conclusion: the templates and all the data have been correctly applied.
Note: you can cancel, delete or send the email from the Follow Up Email → Mail log page.
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