|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
PRODUCT REVIEW
Manage email subscriber publications with kNEWS
By Janine Sutphen
Owning a small business is a challenge. The perception of the small business owner taking a spur-of-the-moment cruise and sipping champagne as the sun dips below the horizon is definitely not the total picture. I know. I have now graduated from being a corporate Domino developer and technical writer to a self -employed Domino systems analyst and technical writer. I provide analysis of Domino database design, documentation, end-user manuals, and procedures to small businesses. I also manage the marketing and advertising of my company.
Once upon a time, in time before the Internet, the bulk of one's business came from word-of-mouth referrals. Now, to maintain visibility, one must use multiple marketing strategies. The combination of the Internet and email has provided a powerful, low-cost method to reach large numbers of people. However, sending unsolicited emails generates unwanted irritation.
Gallatin Technologies, Inc. (at http://www.gallatin.com), in developing kNEWS, a permission-based email subscription application, has taken a large step in solving the problem for companies that use Lotus Notes. Although there appear to be some definition inconsistencies and some design flaws in the application, the four kNEWS databases, working together, enable companies to keep in touch with their customers by sending newsletters and then monitoring and analyzing the results of their marketing endeavors.
How Does kNEWS Work?
kNEWS consists of four collaborative databases:
- kNEWS Subscription, a repository for subscriber names either deposited from a Web registration form or imported into the database;
- kNEWS Publication, a database with publication style documents, articles, and newsletters;
- kNEWS Reporting, a database containing statistical reports;
- kNEWS Logging, which keeps track of ongoing activity in the other databases.
Going from start to finish, eight steps are needed to accomplish the goal of having customers receive the appropriate newsletter: define the campaign; create groups and publication categories; register subscribers; specify parameters for the publication style; write the articles; create the newsletter; mail the publication to the subscribers, and analyze the statistics.
Defining a campaign
First, a campaign is defined. This is done in kNEWS Reporting. According to Gallatin Technologies, campaigns are a collection of statistics about subscribers and publications and can be related to both groups and publications. A campaign is assigned either an active or inactive status. Only one campaign can be active at a time. To me, campaigns are marketing strategies, and it's not clear how they're used in this application. I hope that in a future release this ambiguity is clarified.
[ Next ]
|
|
|
|
|
|
-- Advertisement --
AUTOMATE LOTUS NOTES USER ID MANAGEMENT
ID Manager 4.5 from HELP Software provides a new level of automaton for managing Lotus Notes IDs. ID Manager lets Lotus Notes administrators get out of the business of creating and managing user IDs. Use our ROI calculator to see how quickly ID Manager will pay for itself.
Learn more about HELP Software products |
-- Advertisement --
Webinar: Agents Gone Wild! with Rocky Oliver & John Kingsley
We can all appreciate what agents can do for us when they're on our team, but how do you identify agents that aren't doing what they're supposed to be doing?
In this webinar we'll discuss tips to help you manage your agents more effectively, including ways to identify all of your agents, to give them the makeover they need, locate agents with errors at run time, and more.
View this webinar! |
|
|
|
|
|
|
