Area 10 [archive] - BUILD YOUR OWN WEBSITE PART ELEVEN

I will preface this page by saying that you will have to have read and absorbed Part 9 (mailboxes) at least, before you set up Autoresponders. This page explains how to set up basic "Inbox Rules" for your mail; these need to be in place before you can address the question of Autoresponders.

Assuming that you have set up the criteria for the mail to which you wish to Auto-respond, you need to draft out the message you intend to send back to the specified e-mail incoming.

Click on "Compose Message". In the "to" box it's usual to put something like "sender", or "author"; the subject box might be something like "Thank you (re mail to Steve).

The text of the message is up to you, obviously: something minimal is quite adequate, eg. This is an Autoresponder just to let you know your message arrived safely; I'll be back to you as soon as I can. Regards, steve@johnbull.force9.co.uk .

Alternatively you might be responding to a catalogue request and can say the catalogue will be in the post within 48 hours (in which case you would have set up a "rule" in the properties box to a "send catalogues to" mailbox).

You could even conceivably include your catalogue details (if brief) within the body of your Autoresponder e-mail [probably up to the limit of 6 x A4 print-out, say].

Obviously, the content is entirely up to you - the only proviso is that it should relate directly in some way to what the person wrote to you requesting [eg if they have e-mailed catalogue.request@johnbull.force9.co.uk then they should be getting something back specifically about catalogues. If your service provider gives you unlimited e-mails, this will allow you to handle a great deal of your correspondence semi-automatically, in due course.

The next step is to save your file. Do the usual File - Save (this will put it into your draft folder [from which we later copy manually into a specific Autoresponder copies file, for ease of reference]).

Next, use the File - Save As option, and decide where you're going to keep the main copy you will use to send out. We keep ours in the Safefile (a subdivision of our main PHC WEBSITE folder); Safefile has a Mail subfolder, and within that is an Autoresponders sub-folder. Set up your folders / subfolders using Windows Explorer (you can minimise - small hyphen top left of your message page - your draft letter whilst you do this) then, using Save As, you locate the file-path to where you want to house this letter, in the usual way [via the Suitcase icon etc., as previously].

When you've got it in the correct sub-sub-folder (or wherever) check that the file title you want comes up in the long box near the bottom, and that below that it's saying it will save it as a Mail (*.eml) file. Click on OK.

Next step is to close the file (which will remain saved in your draft folder) and put it into the Inbox rules. Note that once it becomes part of the inbox rules you will not be able to modify the version you've saved in your (eg) Safefile\Mail\Autoresponders file, in any way, unless you "click off" the tick in the main inbox rules listings which cover that particular Autoresponder (this may sound complex now but you'll see what's meant as you become more used to using the Inbox Rules).

Now go to your Inbox Rules and select "Properties" for the specific type of e-mail to which you want to send the Autoresponder you've just made. Go to the "Reply with" option (activate as usual by clicking the little box by it to put in the tick) and click on "Browse": then find your way (via the suitcase icon, etc.) to the folder where you just filed your Autoresponder. Open the folder and click on your selected reply message (to highlight) and click on Open. This will bring you back to the Properties window where you will see your specified file listed (put your cursor in the box and use the forward arrows on your keyboard if you can't see all the details listed); click on OK and you will see your Inbox Rule complete with specified Autoresponder.

And that's all there is to it. It might take you 20 minutes to set up the first one, but after that, not long at all.

When you use Send and Receive in the future, you'll see your messages come in and then you can check what's in your "Outbox" to make sure the right Autoresponders are going out on cue. You can delete any mistakes before you do "Send and Receive" again [and if your program automatically checks for mail at any less than 5 minutes intervals you may wish to modify this accordingly]; if you have long pre-set intervals between automatic mail retrievals you will probably wish to use "Send and Receive" again before you log off.

Surprisingly few people use Autoresponders - but they're amazingly easy to set up, once you get used to the processes involved. And they're free!

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