Newsletter Builder v2.00 Beta 1

By Dave - September 6, 2012

Hello All,

We've been hard an work this last week and have finished a major upgrade to Newsletter Builder. In fact, there are so many new features we've bumped up the version number and we're calling this release 2.0.

Note: 2.0 is currently in beta, but as soon as it's released (probably a few days) we're going to raising the price. So if you want the best deal order a copy now (you get free upgrades). Even if you're not totally sure our 90 day money back guarantee means you can try it out and make up your mind later.

If you're not using Newsletter Builder yet you can read more about it and purchase a copy here:
http://www.interactivetools.com/add-ons/detail.php?Newsletter-Builder-1066

And if you've already purchased you can download the beta here - we're running this version ourselves.
http://www.interactivetools.com/add-ons/my_purchases.php

Here's a list of the major new features:
- Open Tracking: Message Menu now displays the number of users who opened or viewed a message
- Click Tracking: Message Menu now displays the times message links were clicked and total users who clicked
- Advanced Logging: Entries are tracked for: Subscribes, Confirms, Unsubscribes, Sent Messages, Opens, and Views
- Subscriber History: Subscriber menu shows history of user actions from Log Menu
- Archive Only: New option allows you to add old newsletters or content to online archive without sending mailout
- Faster Mailing: Mailer routines have been optimized to process emails faster and minimize required disk space

Let me know any questions or feedback, thanks!
Dave Edis - Senior Developer
interactivetools.com

Re: [Dave] Newsletter Builder v2.00 Beta 1

By ispro - September 9, 2012

I have installed Newsletter Builder, but as I understand it, there is only one mailing list. In a system such as Constant Contact, a user can belong to one or more lists. I would think that multiple lists is a major functional requirement.

Re: [ispro] Newsletter Builder v2.00 Beta 1

By Dave - September 10, 2012

Hi ispro,

Thanks for the suggestion.

We actually had multiple lists in the original version 1 requirements but cut it when the user-interface was a bit too clunky. We want to keep it as simple as possible for admins to send out newsletter and users to signup and manage their subscriptions.

It's on the feature request list for a future version. We ourselves could use that feature as we have a newsletter list and a secondary email list for CMSB beta tests.

Thanks!

Note to readers: If you buy the unlimited license you can install it on as many CMSB sites as you have, but this request is about the ability to have multiple lists on a single site.
Dave Edis - Senior Developer
interactivetools.com

Re: [Dave] Newsletter Builder v2.00 Beta 1

By Djulia - September 11, 2012

Hi dave,

Would it be possible to add fullname with the email?

Thanks!

Djulia

Re: [Djulia] Newsletter Builder v2.00 Beta 1

By Dave - September 11, 2012

Hi Djulia,

Do you mean to the subscribe form and to the "to" address of the email that is sent?
Dave Edis - Senior Developer
interactivetools.com

Re: [Dave] Newsletter Builder v2.00 Beta 1

By Djulia - September 11, 2012

Hi Dave,

Yes, do you think that it is possible?

Thanks!

Djulia

Re: [Dave] Newsletter Builder v2.00 Beta 1

By Maurice - September 11, 2012

Hi dave,

we have been testing the Nieuwsletter Builder but its not realy a builder just a sender the name should be "newsletter sender".

before building maybe ask the users what there wishes would be.

cause i'm missing some simple features that would be much better.

some thing simple as being able to use templates.
just going with a different aproach (thinking more out of the box) would be worth the price a user would have to pay.

now pricing is getting hire for options that could easly be solved in a different way.

but still for some of our customers "newsletter sender" would be cool.

keep up the great work,

Maurice
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Dropmonkey.nl

Re: [Maurice] Newsletter Builder v2.00 Beta 1

By Dave - September 12, 2012

Hi Maurice,

hah, I honestly didn't think too much about the name. It just went well with the existing naming scheme. You can certainly call it Newsletter Sender if you like. :)

Our first goal with this was to replace our own outdated perl/cgi newsletter software, as well as have it support the requirements for a consulting project we were working on. So we hit those targets, and have already added some new features for 2.0 which I'll push out of beta soon.

Templates and a whole host of other features on on the wishlist for future releases. No timeline yet but I'm sure it will continue to evolve. This is just the start for this plugin. We've just finished adding our 116 back-issues to our newsletter archive: http://www.interactivetools.com/news/ (and we're still cleaning up the old HTML). We use to have to do all that twice, send a newsletter, add a page to the CMS. Nice to have it all automated finally. So it's already saving us a ton of time.

Thanks for the feedback, cheers!
Dave Edis - Senior Developer
interactivetools.com

Re: [Djulia] Newsletter Builder v2.00 Beta 1

By Dave - September 12, 2012

Hi Djulia,

I could probably post some code-edits to do that to the latest version (2.0) if it would be helpful. Basically we'd just add a field to the subscribe form for name and the subscriber table and then add it to the outgoing emails as well.

There are pros and cons of both approaches, we didn't include it because the less you ask of the user the more likely they are to subscribe, and we didn't want to over-complicate the form or want to support it being user definable (eg: do we add full name, or first and last fields, or first, last, and company, etc).

But I'd be happy to see if I can come up with a (unsupported) code patch for you (let me know if you want that).

Another idea we're thinking about for the future is the ability to specify a SQL query to get the subscriber list. So if you had another table with all the emails you could pull the name and email from that with a custom SQL query. If you used that option you wouldn't use the signup form.

Lastly, I wanted to let you know I've been thinking about how to implement language translation files on a per plugin basis to handle plugin specific language. Perhaps with a preset /lang/ folder that can come with the plugin.

Let me know any feedback, thanks!
Dave Edis - Senior Developer
interactivetools.com

Re: [Dave] Newsletter Builder v2.00 Beta 1

By Maurice - September 12, 2012

Hi Dave.

Agree whats in a name but your last email newsletter.

A) did not work in our outlook we just saw code.
B) looked awful compared to the old one (and i think many people will agree on that.)

but like always and as a true IT follower we will stay optimistic in the hope one day it will all change ahahahahahahahahahaha

keep up the great work

Maurice
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Dropmonkey.nl