Where to start?

This guide will help you get acquainted with the basic functionality of enKod and understand the platform at the start of your work.

You can find links to all necessary instructions in the platform under the “Getting Started” button in the top right corner of your account or in the left menu, under “Need some help?” → Getting Started.

Mailing groups

This is a list of customers, who are consenting to recieve mailings. Groups are assigned to contacts and allow you to control communications, sending messages only to those topics and channels for which the user has given permission.

You can create groups for different purposes, for example: a group for mass communications, a group for customers of a certain category and others.

Data fields

Data fileds are made for storing additional information about a contact that you want to use in your work (for example, to segment or personalise communications).

You can store a contact's location, the number of children, status, and more in data fields.

Address the recipient in an email by name or select all contacts who attended a specific event. Data fields are designed to do just that.

File preparation

Rules for correctly uploading contacts to the account:

• the file with contacts are required to be in .csv or .zip format (with .csv file);
• file size up to 150MB;
• UTF-8 encoding;
• delimiters “,” or “;”

To make it easier to understand the requirements, we have prepared for you file template.

Don't forget to fill the file with additional information about your contacts (e.g. names, if you store them) in addition to the email addresses themselves.

Downloading the database

1. Preparing and downloading a file

Create a contact list based on the template. Upload the file to the platform using manual import via Data ➔ Contacts ➔ Actions ➔ Import contacts.

2. Matching data fields and columns

After selecting the file, match the data fields and columns you created earlier to ensure that all the information you need is correctly recorded.

3. Attaching mailing groups

Be sure to attach mailing groups so that you can send messages to your customers after the import. Once this step is complete, the file reconciliation will start.

4. File reconciliation

Reconciliation is an analysis of the import file and is performed in the background. You can monitor imports via Data ➔ Imports

Completing an import

After the reconciliation step, you need to complete the import.

Select what you want to do with new contacts and what you want to do with existing contacts. When importing contacts for the first time, they will all fall into the “New” category. Select “add” in the appropriate row to upload them to enKod.

Contact card

After the import is complete, open the contact card from Data ➔ Contacts ➔ Click on the email address and check that all the person's details have been entered in the fields required.

Creating segments

Segments are filters for contacts in your database. A variety of conditions will allow you to categorise all subscribers into groups based on values in data fields or activity in messages.

Segmenting your database is necessary to increase the personalisation of your newsletters. Segmentation makes it possible to distinguish the target group from the general list of contacts.

For example, you can send an email only to female representatives of a certain age or to those who have read the previous email. You can also combine several criteria for more precise selection.

The main conditions that you will need at first are conditions on field values and on messages sent.

Example segment

Try creating a segment that selects all contacts from Moscow. Recalculate the segment to check that the selection is correct.

Gradually increase the number of recipients to improve your reputation. This is a very important process that will affect all your future work in the account.

Reputation depends on:

• whether your emails will be delivered
• in which folder they appear to recipients (inbox or spam).

A bad reputation of a sender leads to blacklisting: emails that you are sending will be blocked by mail services.

Warming up involves regularly sending different messages to segments of recipients of a certain size.

Example of a warm-up segment

A warm-up segment includes several conditions: subscribing to the mailing group you selected when importing the database, and sending a message with the tag “warm-up” to avoid duplicate messages. The conditions should be configured so that they work simultaneously.

In addition, in the warm-up segments you should set a limit on the number of contacts in accordance with your warm-up plan.

To create your first message go to Mailings ➔ Messages ➔ New message ➔ Email. You will be taken to the message editor, which consists of several steps.

In enKod, you can customise the message so that it is:

• sent immediately after creation
• sent on the date and time you specify
• sent regularly according to a set schedule
• sent when an API request is received
• sent when a certain event occurs
• sent at the moment of subscription to confirm it

There are several ways to create a message in enKod. The method you choose depends on whether you have some basis for the message or whether you will create it from scratch.

• To manually create a message without HTML knowledge, use the the inbuilt block editor
• If you have an archive of your customised message or HTML, upload it to the editor.
• If you don't know where to start yet, use our post templates.

After creating the email itself, you can personalise the content using personalisation tags (dynamic content).

Personalisation in newsletters allows you to tailor your message to specific recipients, increasing the likelihood that they will read the email and take a targeted action.

Personalisation also improves customer relations, increases customer loyalty and increases the effectiveness of marketing campaigns.

Data fields that were previously created and populated with information when the database was imported can now be displayed in the message.

Personalisation. Contact name

Open the dynamic contact manager in an HTML editor (or edit the text container in a block editor) and use the “Contact First Name” tag {{onboarding:subscriber_firstname}} in the text of the message at the place where it is required. Now the recipient will not see a dry “Good afternoon” but a more personal “Good afternoon, Ivan!”

Using personalisation in the HTML editor

Using personalisation in the block editor

Personalisation. Link unsubscribe

Be sure to add an unsubscribe link to your email to give your recipients the option to unsubscribe from communications. Otherwise, they'll just send the email to spam and your reputation on emailers will start to plummet. To add an unsubscribe link, select the desired tag (for example, {{onboarding:link_unsubscribe}}) which is named Unfollow all mailing groups in the dynamic content manager.

Using personalisation in the HTML editor

Using personalisation in the block editor

Personalisation. Preview

To see how personalisation works, use the preview. Enter the email address of any contact who has a name filled in you contact base and see how the email will look specifically for that contact.

This step is used to select the contacts to whom you want to send the newsletter.

It can be a mailing group, a segment or both. The message will not be duplicated if the contact is in a segment and subscribed to a mailing group, i.e. only one email will be sent to him/her.

If you have a list of email addresses in .csv format, you can send a mailing to this list by uploading it at the “Select Recipients” step. In addition, you can exclude a certain segment from the recipients.

We've covered the core features and tools of the platform that will allow you to effectively manage your newsletters, segment your audience, personalise your messages and maximise results.

We hope that you now have a better understanding of how the enKod platform can help you with your tasks.

Remember, successful email marketing requires not only quality content, but also a smart approach to segmentation, personalisation and message delivery. enKod provides you with everything you need for this, and we are ready to support you every step of the way. We remind you that our team is always ready to help you with any questions related to the platform operation.