So you finally signed up for Flodesk and created a great opt-in to boost your subscriber list. Now what? You make a welcome sequence to introduce those new subscribers to all you have to offer. Creating a welcome sequence with Flodesk is not only easy but can be a great way to show your new subscriber what they’ve signed up for! This can help build trust, grow your social media and increase your open rate with your list.
Benefits Of A Newsletter Welcome Sequence
Make A Good First Impression
A welcome sequence is a great way to control the first impression your subscriber gets from you. They’ve signed up for your opt-in and are ready to dig into your content. Instead of them losing sight of you, make a good first impression by appearing in their inbox with content they want and a professional look. This also gives you control of what they see. Did they sign up for a recipe freebie and your next weekly email is all about fashion? That’s confusing. A welcome sequence can control what to expect and make a good first impression. Control the narrative and send them an email that explains what you cover and what to expect from you.
Build Trust And Establish A Relationship
Welcoming your subscriber with trustworthy content that isn’t spammy is a great way to start off your digital relationship with your reader. It also helps to establish this relationship so they’re more likely to open your emails in the future as they are getting to know you through this welcome sequence and build trust.
Grow Your Following
Create an email in your welcome series that introduces your subscriber to another social platform they may be interested in. If they subscribed in the first place, they’re likely interested and ready to consume more content. Create an email with a call to action to follow on one of your social networks for increased followers and engagement.
How To Make A Welcome Sequence In Flodesk
Let’s hypothetically create a common scenario on why we’d want to make a freebie and welcome sequence. Many of us may have a handful of posts that perform well on Google or Pinterest but aren’t the bulk of our content. Maybe you’re getting a lot of hits to an old recipe, but you don’t really write a TON of recipes on your blog. You want to capture that traffic and turn those one-time Google referral readers into hopefully long-time readers. Here’s what we’d do.
Step 1 – Create a Freebie
Drive sign-ups to your welcome series workflow by making a great opt-in freebie to capture readers that are inspired by the post they’re landing on the most. You can learn more about our freebie ideas here. We also love using Canva to make our freebies from style capsule guides, recipe meal plans, and beauty guides. The ideas are endless!
Upload your freebie to your website as PDF media so you can link to it in the workflow you’re about to create.
Step 2 – Create a Workflow
In Flodesk, create a workflow for your welcome sequence. Select one of the premade templates or start from scratch. You’ll pull the media URL from this to link to in your email.
Step 3 – Trigger Your Workflow
You’ll want your workflow to kick in when it’s triggered by a subscriber being added to a segment. Create a new segment for these specific subscribers you’re capturing with this opt-in freebie.
Step 4 – Create Welcome Email 1
Welcome your newest subscribers to the meal plan in this email. Thank them for signing up and share with them their new weekly meal plan freebie. Create an obvious button CTA so they can easily download it. Let them know there’s more to come so it doesn’t feel one and done. A few tips on this first email, include their first name to personalize it, sign off with your name and make the email short and sweet but personable.
Step 5 – Set Up Welcome Email 2
Set a delay of a few days until your next email goes out. You don’t want to bombard them, but you don’t want too much time to go by that they’re unlikely to open your email. In the follow up email, mention the weekly meal plan and see if they’re liking it to jog their memory! That’s how they found you after all. Then introduce the subscriber to who you are and what to expect as being a subscriber. This is a great way to build trust and maybe include a CTA to follow you on social so they don’t miss a thing.
Step 6 – Set Up Welcome Email 3
Set another delay after email 2 before your next email goes out for a few days. Again don’t wait too long! In this next email, you can introduce your subscriber to different content. You’ve already showed them your great freebie that they were intrigued by, and you introduced yourself and what to expect, now serve them new content. Share with them your most popular post, or a category you really love to write about. In this example, since the freebie and outlier of your traffic are recipes, you can maybe introduce them to hosting tips, holiday ideas, or make it playful and say my recipes are delicious, but my outfit recipes are even better! This is such a great way to ease people into new categories that they may not know you cover especially if they’re coming from Google Search.
You can make a 4th email if you like, but if you already send weekly emails, may be good to skip this! If you’re don with this workflow, you can set up a step that moves them into your ALL subscriber segment so you can email them with other news. However, you have your Flodesk segments organized will dictate this.
Step 7 – Publish Your Workflow, And Create Your Opt-In Forms
Now that your workflow is published you want people to opt into the freebie so they can start to work their way through it. Create your pop-up or inline forms to start capturing emails and building those relationships with your subscribers.
Since we’ve created a food-related opt-in and workflow, we would make sure to include these pop-ups on ANY and all posts on our blog that are remotely related to this topic. Recipes, healthy eating or living, entertaining, etc. Using the Header Footer Code Manager, you can control this super easily with tags or categories on your site. So anything with XYZ tags or categories will show your new recipe opt-in. Learn more about how to connect Flodesk to your WordPress site here.
