[intro]In this Guide, you’ll learn about all the settings you need to configure before you begin to create your first email newsletter. Before you begin, you need to ensure that not only does your EKM online shop have a domain, but that you’ve set up an email address on that domain so customers have a professional contact email for them to contact you if need be. [/intro]

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Before you begin to create your first email newsletter, it’s essential that you configure your Settings first. This ensures that the correct details are displayed on your email and that when your customers subscribe to your newsletter, the confirmation they receive is configured correctly.

1. To begin, from the EKM Email Marketing Dashboard, click the Settings tab:

This page will load with Your Details by default. The email address is not used to send email newsletters - the rest of the fields should be completed with contact details for your EKM online shop, which can be set to display in the footer of your email newsletter:

Email Footer

2. Click Email Footer on the left-hand side:

3. This will reveal a list of checkboxes:

The Company Name is always set to display by default, but the rest of the boxes are optional. If your EKM online shop trades purely online, then it’s recommended that you tick the box to Display Telephone Number, so customers have a point of contact in case there are any issues. However, if you have a physical shop as well as your EKM online shop, click all of the boxes to ensure that the address of the shop premises is displayed.

4. When you have finished ticking the boxes, click the green Save button on the bottom right of the page.

Custom Email Address

5. Click Custom Email Address:

6. On this page, you can amend the address that the email newsletter is sent from, and the email address that customers can reply to:

Outgoing Email Address

7. The Outgoing Email Address by default is set as your EKM Email Marketing username:

8. You need to amend this to be something more applicable for your EKM online shop, like this:

Campaign Defaults

9. The Campaign Defaults are the ‘From’ name and the ‘Reply-To’ address. You need to amend these so that the name and email address are applicable to your EKM online shop:

[remember] The Default Reply-To Address needs to be an actual email address you have set up on your shop domain, such as 'team@yourdomainname.co.uk'. If your shop domain is hosted by EKM Domains, click here for a Guide that explains how to set up a domain email address. However, if your domain is hosted elsewhere, you need to contact your domain provider to set up an email address on that domain that your customers can use to contact you.

Under no circumstances should you add a free personal email address into that field, such as @btinternet, @gmail, @yahoo, @aol, etc - as doing so not only looks unprofessional, but can seriously impact your newsletter as it may be marked as spam by email providers. [/remember]

10. When you have finished making changes, click the green Save button on the bottom right:

Signup Confirmation Email

1. To create your Signup Confirmation Email, you will need to upload a copy of your logo into your EKM Email Marketing account before you begin. From the Dashboard page, click the Settings tab:

2. Then click Signup Confirmation Email on the left-hand side of the page:

3. This will take you to the Signup Confirmation Email page. There is a default email already, and you can see this by clicking the Preview button on the right-hand side:

4. To create your own version of the Signup Confirmation Email, click the green Add Custom button on the right-hand side:

[caution]A Signup Confirmation Email is a basic notification, so you need to keep it very simple. You don’t need to add in a lot of text, graphics or different sections; you just need a variation of that default template that is customised to your brand. The simpler this email design is, the more chance you have of it not being blocked or going into the spam folders of your customer’s email inboxes. [/caution]

The Visual Designer Dashboard

On the right-hand side, you’ll see three tabs - Content, Rows and Settings. The Visual Designer will always open by default on the Content tab.

Content

Text - This will add a cell the width of the area it is added to for you to add text to. 

Image - This will allow you to add an image from the File Manager to your email newsletter. 

Button - This will add a button to a cell which can then be hyperlinked to a Product Page. 

Divider - A divider provides an accent line between cells to split up the design. 

Social - Drag this onto your email newsletter to add icons for Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn.

HTML - Use this to add an HTML element to your newsletter.

Video - This element allows you to add the URL of an existing video to your newsletter. 

Rows

Dragging elements from this panel into your newsletter creates cells that can be populated with different content. When you have dragged your chosen row onto your newsletter, simply return to the Content tab to drag some content into each cell of the row. 

Settings

Within the Settings tab, you can amend the width of the email newsletter, the background colour, font and link colour.

5. When you have finished creating your own Signup Confirmation Email, you need to click the blue Save button on the right-hand side:

6. Then scroll to the bottom of the page and click the green Spam Check button:

7. You’ll then see this window, whilst the quality of your Signup Confirmation Email is checked:

8. If there are any issues highlighted within the spam check, it’s important that you rectify these before you send your newsletter; having issues with your content can prevent customers from being able to receive your newsletters. You then need to click the green Continue button:

9. Back on the main page, you need to click Make Active:

10. You’ll then see this window appear. Click the green button:

11. Your email will then go through a second spam check. Your next step then is to amend the Signup Email Details. In the Friendly From field, you need to add the name or terminology which will be displayed next to your email address. For the Subject field, just ‘Newsletter Confirmation’ is fine but you can change it to suit your brand. When you have completed both fields, you need to click the green Save button:

Now you have configured your Signup Confirmation Email, which is what customers will receive automatically in the process of subscribing to your Email Newsletters; your next step would be to create some Contact Groups, which you can do within this Guide. 

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[contact] If you need our help with your EKM online shop, contact your Ecommerce Expert or the Customer Support Team, who will be able to point you in the right direction. We're open from 8am-6pm weekdays and 9am-5.30pm weekends. If you'd like to suggest a feature or an upgrade on any of the EKM platforms, please let us know on the EKM Suggestions Board. If you have a non-account-specific question to ask the EKM Team, join us in the EKM Community. [/contact]