Autoresponders
Whether you are responding to the same type of e-mail on a daily basis
or you would just like to add an automatic response to e-mails sent to a
specific domain address, you can accomplish such a task using the "autoresponder".
An autoresponder will send a standard response e-mail message (based on a
text file you specify) to anyone who sends an e-mail to a specific e-mail
address (which you specify) at your domain. Each of our hosting plans
allow you to set up a specific number of autoresponders for free. You can
set up additional autoresponders for a small additional charge of
$1.00/month per autoresponder.
How to set up an
autoresponder:
- Create a plain text file which contains the message you wish to have
automatically sent (e.g. sales_request_response.txt) and upload it to
your domain in ASCII mode via FTP.
- Use your Web browser to go to the E-mail Settings section of your
account Control Panel (go to yourdomain.com/stats/ and enter your userID
and password, click on E-mail Settings and re-enter your userID and
password if requested). This page allows you to set your
e-mail forwarding,
POP accounts, and autoresponders for your
account.
- Go to the 'Autoresponders' section of your E-mail Settings page. It
will look like this:
- Under the "@your_domain" heading, enter the e-mail address
at your domain which is intended to invoke the autoresponder. For
example, if you want an autoresponse message sent to anyone who sends an
e-mail to "info@yourdomain.com", you would enter "info".
When a user sends an e-mail message to this address
(info@yourdomain.com) the autoresponder will automatically reply with
the message you specify.
- Under the "File to send" heading, enter the location of the
text file you uploaded in step 1 which contains the autoresponse
message. The text in this file will be sent in an e-mail message to
whomever sends an e-mail to the address you specified in step 4. Be sure
to enter the complete path to the file relative to your home directory
(example: /subdir/mystuff/services.txt). If you uploaded the file to the
main level of your account (the 'root') you would just enter the name of
the file, since the file is not located within any subdirectories.
- Under the "Reply to" heading, enter the e-mail address from
which you want to have your autoresponse message appear to be coming.
This address will appear in the 'From:' heading in the autoresponse
e-mail. If the user replies to the autoresponse message, the reply will
be sent to this e-mail address.
- Optionally, under the "Who to Notify" heading, enter the
e-mail address of someone you want to have receive a copy of the
original incoming e-mail message that invoked the autoresponder.
In the above example, any person who sends an e-mail to "info@yourdomain.com"
will receive an auto-response via e-mail which contains the message from
the file named "services.txt". If the recipient replies to the
auto-response, their reply will be delivered to the address "sales@your_domain".
Also, a copy of the original incoming e-mail will be sent to "bob@somedomain.com".
Adding a Subject: line
Most e-mail messages you receive have the following header
information: (To: From: Subject:). To specify a subject, you can simply
add a line at the top of the autoresponder message text file (step
1) that reads:
Subject: Information about our services
You would replace 'Information about our services' with whatever subject
you want to have for the autoresponse e-mail.