Introduction

Sending personalized welcome emails is a special way to welcome the newest members of your community. This guide explains how to automatically email your new members right from your personal email address. In this case, you’ll be using a combination of Zapier, a survey tool, and an email app. 

Why send new members personalized welcome emails?

Sending personalized notes are a small touch that help kick your membership off to a great start and make your listeners feel valued. This both improves your workflow and allows you to easily extend the lifetime value of your membership program. 

Which apps does this work with?

We’ve tested with the following apps, but feel free to set it up slightly differently with your preferred set of tools:

• Gmail

If your desired tools aren’t listed above, it may still work. Search the Zapier directory or reach out to us at hello[at]glow.fm. If you get it working with a different set of apps, we’d love to hear about it - let us know!

How it works

General

There are four accounts you’ll need:

• A published Glow account: We also recommend creating a test member that you can use to test your set-up. If you've signed up for your own Glow page using your email, that will work. If you haven't, register on your Glow page in a private browser using your own email address. This will serve as a member that you can test with in Zapier.
• Google forms: if you want to send an onboarding survey, you'll want a way to collect information from your listeners, like their names and birthdays.
• Gmail: To send your personalized email
• Zapier: The tool that will power these integrations

Once you have these four accounts set up, create a two Zaps: one to ask for survey responses and another to send personalized emails

Example

We’ve highlighted GSuite to walk you through the set up. If you use a different email, calendar, and survey tool that integrates with Zapier, you can set those up with similar processes.

Create a Zap: Welcome new members with a welcome email and your listener onboarding survey

Step 1: Create a zap

To create a Zap, click “Make a Zap” in Zapier. 

Step 2: Connect Glow

First, choose “Glow” for your App and “Listener Added” for your Trigger Event

Next, Zapier will prompt you to sign into your Glow account. 

Click “Test and Review.” You should see sample listeners. Find your “test member:” the member you created using your own email. 

Then click “Done Editing”

Step 3: Connect Gmail

First, choose + to add an action. Choose “Gmail” for your App” and “Send Email” as your Action Event. 

Choose the account you want to send the email from and then “Draft email.”

Select “Listener email” as the person you want to send the email to, and fill out the rest of the email as you like. 

Draft the email with a welcome message and a link to your onboarding survey (sample survey here). Make sure your onboarding sample asks for First and Last names in separate fields. Other things that you can ask for in an onboarding survey might be the listeners’ birthdays (send them a birthday email!). 

Here’s what this email might look like in Zapier:

Then, click “Test and Review.” If Zapier returns a green success message, you’re all set. Click “Done Editing.” Now, your listeners will have an easy way to give you their information.. It’s time to record that information in a spreadsheet. 

Create a Zap: Send a personalized welcome email to listeners, addressed to them by first name

Step 1: Create a second zap

To create a Zap, click “Make a Zap” in Zapier. 

Step 2: Connect the Spreadsheet that’s linked to your Google Form

First, choose “Google Sheets” as your desired app and “New or Updated Spreadsheet Row” as your Trigger event. 

Next, Zapier will prompt you to sign into your Google account. 

Click “Test and Review.” You should see sample listeners. Find your “test member:” the member you created using your own email. 

Step 3: Draft your welcome email

Click “+.”

Now, choose “Gmail” as your App, and “Send Email in Gmail” as your Trigger Event. 

Next, write and format your email.Using Zapier to format your email can make it come across a bit funky. We recommend using an HTML formatter to make sure that your email is formatted correctly. Here’s an easy, free tool you can use to do this. Type your desired note on the left side of the screen, and copy and paste the HTML on the right side of the screen.

Go back to Zapier and write your email. 

Under “To”, send it to the listener by their email address. Some podcasters also like to bcc themselves on emails to fans.

Choose a Subject line. 

Select “HTML” under Body Type in Zapier, and copy/paste the HTML into the body. Select the “+” button to address the listener by their first name in your email. 

Click “Continue.” Then, “Test and Review.”

If the green box pops up in Zapier, you should be all set. 

Congrats! You’re now sending listeners a personalized welcome emails.