Welcome
We hope you enjoy the experience of working with our service and that it becomes an important part of your online marketing strategy. Our service has grown by following the needs of our customers. We take every comment and feature request to heart and incorporate changes to our development plans daily based on this feedback. So as you work, do not hesitate to contact us and let us know what you think. How can we make things work better for you? What new features would you like to see?

This User's Guide describes the key components of this e-marketing platform and how they can be used to address particular tasks. Like the software, this guide is not yet a completed work. Both are evolving every day as we work to create a comprehensive platform for building e-newsletter and e-marketing programs.

Please take a moment to read the remainder of this introduction. It provides some important background information that will be helpful to know as you read the rest of this guide and begin working with the service.

Understanding Content Management and Template Driven Layout
Our service provides a unique and powerful model for improving the efficiency of constructing and managing e-newsletter and e-marketing campaigns. It is important to understand this approach so that you gain the most value and productivity from the software.

This platform is comprised of several core components:

Content Management - Where articles, surveys, pictures, and other content are added, edited, and managed.

Layout Templates - Where the page design and organization is determined.

List Management - Where subscriber records are added, removed, imported, exported, and manipulated.

Reporting and Analysis - Where subscriber activity is measured and reports are displayed.

All of these components work together seamlessly through an easy-to-use interface that operates through a Web browser located anywhere in the world. The Main Menu which appears after login, is the starting point for all major tasks.

Content is Separate from Layout
As you work, it is important to remember the way this system separates content (articles, surveys, letters, etc.) from the layout (look-and-feel). This separation is done purposefully to provide greater productivity than traditional page layout methods. For instance, unlike page layout programs, you do not need to adjust the page layout of your e-newsletter each time you add a new article. Instead, you enter articles into a separate content database (through the Article Entry screen). When it is time to publish your newsletter, a layout template automatically pulls the appropriate material from your content database. The layout template can be configured just once to present a standard "look" for your publication, and can remain untouched each time you publish a new edition.

Articles are included in the newsletter according to the rules in the template. In addition, properties assigned to each article determine how articles are positioned relative to each other, and whether or not an article appears at all. The combination of the rules and these properties ultimately determines the appearance of the newsletter page. When an account is created, a set of default templates are configured so that little or no template changes are needed to get your first publication completed. However, the system is flexible enough to produce completely customized layouts and rules.

Article Properties
While the main content of your newsletter is defined by specifying the Title, Sub-title, Synopsis, and Body of your articles, other information such as Position Rating, Begin Date, and Topic area determine where and how the content appears. Articles are automatically positioned in your newsletter according to a rating scale (1 to 100). The higher the rating, the higher the article appears on the page. There are also certain thresholds that determine which page and location an article will appear. For instance, the default threshold for the cover page is 76. Articles rated 76 or higher appear on the cover page and in the table of contents. Articles rated between 50 and 75 appear only in the table of contents and on inside Topic pages. Articles rated lower than 50 will not appear unless you place them directly into the layout template or construct a region on the template that will automatically display articles with this rating.

Layout Properties
The page templates defined through the Layout Editor contain one or more regions known as Page Elements. These elements have rules (layout properties) that determine what type of information will appear at the corresponding location on the page. Page Elements use these rules to automatically pull information from your content database.

Two page elements that are particularly important to your template are the Single Article and Multiple Article elements. Both of these elements are used to display articles from your content database, but they are used for different purposes.

The Multiple Article element is what appears by default on the cover page of your newsletter. This element pulls one or more articles from your content database and shows the material according to its display properties. By default, the article synopsis' are displayed in order by rating, including only those rated at or above 76. A "Full Story" link at the bottom of the synopsis provides a hyperlink to the Article page where the rest of the article body is displayed.

The Single Article element is used primarily on the Article Page template to automatically display the full body of articles which are clicked from the Cover Page. Single article elements can also be placed on other pages and locations (like on the Cover Page), to display specific articles. 

List Management
Your account also includes powerful list management tools that allow you to grow and maintain an active subscriber database. These easy-to-use tools provide professional marketers with all they need to manage their e-newsletter and e-marketing campaigns and gain the most value from customer, prospect, and membership data.

Import
The flexible import procedure makes it easy for large data files to be uploaded to your account. It can be as simple as copying and pasting a list of email addresses from your desktop into your browser or you can upload a tab delimited data file that includes name, mailing address, and other information in addition to email addresses. Then, easily synchronize your online subscriber data with your corporate data, keeping both lists in step with each other.

Subscription Builder
The Subscription Builder lets you define how the automatic subscription management features will operate. You can customize data capture forms that can be copied and pasted to your Web site. You can add new subscribers to specific sub-lists and determine what will happen after a submission occurs. You can then send notifications to system administrators, a welcome message, or a confirmation message to the subscriber.

Subscriber Menu
The Subscriber Menu provides an overview of the sub-lists in your account and how many subscribers are currently located in each one. In addition, the Subscriber Menu is where you go to manage subscribers - running an import, searching, moving from one list to another, processing bounces, etc.

Reporting and Analysis
The reporting engine aggregates data from various parts of the system and presents it in an easy-to-use format. Among other things, these reports can tell you which articles are the most popular and which subscriber is the most active. They let you measure the effectiveness of your email campaign and help you to better refine the content of your newsletter to match the needs and interests of your readers.

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