Shortcuts ⤵️
Before you can run an email course with MailerLite, you definitely need to have a MailerLite account first.
MailerLite itself is a freemium service, and the feature you need to run email course is available on the free version. Even so, I recommend you use the pro version as the free version doesn’t allow you to remove the MailerLite branding on your emails.
You can start from the cheapest plan, which costs you $10 per month for 500 subscribers. As your audience/email list grows bigger, you can upgrade your account.
💡 If you don’t have a MailerLite account yet, you can hit the following button to register an account.
REGISTER A MAILERLITE ACCOUNT
Setting Up a MailerLite Account
First, visit the MailerLite website and click the Sign up button on the menu bar. Complete the registration form and click the Create my account button.
On the next step, you will be asked to verify your email address. Simply click the Review link to proceed.
Check your inbox and find an email from MailerLite. Open it and click the Verify email address button.
Login back with your account to proceed to step 3. Click the Complete link on this step.
You will be asked several questions to complete your profile. Simply answer them and click the Next step button.
On the next step, you will be asked to enter your address and to accept the anti-spam policy. Simply enter your address and accept the policy agreement and click the Confirm button.
Next, you need to confirm your account. Click the Complete link on step 3.
On the confirmation form, you will be asked two questions. Simply answer them. On the Personal website section, select the Website option. Enter your website address and click the Next step button.
A confirmation will be sent to your email address after clicking the Next step button above. Check your inbox to find it and click the Verify email address to confirm.
You will be asked several questions once again. Answer them and click the Confirm button.
The MailerLite team will review your account, which usually takes 24 hours to complete. No worries, they rarely decline your account if you answered all the questions.
Necessary MailerLite Settings
Before sending your first email, you need to make some settings on your MailerLite account to make it match your branding.
A simplest instance, you can replace the default button color to match your website branding.
Remove the MailerLite Branding
By default, every email you send to your subscribers contains a MailerLite logo, which lies at the bottom section of the email body. You need to remove it because it makes you look unprofessional.
To remove the MailerLite logo from your email body, go to the Account settings menu on the MailerLite dashboard.
Under the Company profile tab, scroll down to the MailerLite branding section and switch the toggle off. Click the Save changes button to apply the change.
Email Design
There are two emails that will be sent to your subscribers based on their activities:
- When they subscribe
- When they unsubscribe
To edit the default design of these emails, you can go to your account settings by clicking the Account settings menu like you did above.
# Subscription Confirmation Email
To edit the confirmation email (the email that is sent after they click the subscribe button), you can click the Subscribe settings menu.
Under the Confirmation email tab, click the Edit button to start editing the email design.
As you can see, you will be taken to the editor where you can design the email. You can simply click the element on the canvas area to edit the design.
To add a new element, you can simply drag the element you want to add from the right panel to the canvas area.
Once you are done editing the email design, you can click the Done editing button at the top-right corner. If you also want to edit the thank you page, you can switch to the Thank you page tab.
# Unsubscription Confirmation Email
The steps to editing the design of the unsubscription confirmation email are the same as the subscription email confirmation above.
First, you click the Unsubscribe settings menu on your account settings page.
Click the Edit content button to start editing the design.
Click an existing element to edit it. To add a new element, you can simply drag it from the right panel to the canvas area. Click the Save template button once you are done editing.
Integrating MailerLite and Divi
Before you can start to build an email list on your MailerLite account, the very first thing you need to prepare is a group (aka list).
A group can consist of a certain number of subscribers, depending on your MailerLite plan. You can also create multiple groups according to your needs.
Creating a New Group
To create a group, first, click the Subscribers menu on the MailerLite dashboard.
On the Subscribers page, click the Group tab and click the Create group button to add a new group.
On the appearing box, give your group a name and click the Create button.
Start Connecting MailerLite with Divi
You already have a group on your MailerLite account. You can then start connecting your MailerLite account with your Divi-powered WordPress blog.
If you have imported the landing page template I provided already, you can edit the Email Optin module. If you prefer creating the landing page yourself, that’s okay.
To start connecting MailerLite with Divi, first, click the Integrations tab on your MailerLite dashboard, followed by the Use button on the API section.
Next, click the Generate new token button to generate a new token.
On the appearing box, give your token a name, accept the terms, and click the Create token button.
Copy the generated token. If needed, you can save it to a save place like a password manager or as plain text file. MailerLite only displays the token once for security reasons.
Once you got the token, edit a Divi page where you want to add the email opt-in form to. Add the Email Optin module. If you already have one on your page, simply click the gear icon to edit it.
Under the Content tab, open the Email Account block and select MailerLite on the Service Provider option. Click the ADD button.
Enter your name and paste the token you have copied. End by clicking the SUBMIT button.
Next, you should see the existing groups (called list in Divi) on your MailerLite account. Simply select the one you want to integrate with the form.
Start Running the Email Course
This is the last, yet the most crucial step to run your email course. Before you proceed with this step, make sure you have everything prepared. The course materials in particular.
You can use Google Docs or the similar tools to craft the drafts of your course lessons. Once everything is ready, you can proceed with this step.
Here is how your email course works.
First, your potential students/subscribers visit the landing page you promote. Then, they enter their email address on the email opt-in form and hit the button. MailerLite will then send the emails according to interval you have set, ideally 24 hours from one email to another (the next email).
💡 I highly recommend greet your students with a welcome email, which is sent immediately after they hit the subscribe button.
Once the sequence is over (meaning all emails have been sent), you then move your new subscribers to a new group. You need to do this in order to make it easy for you to communicate with your subscribers.
For instance, if you want to send a new broadcast email (newsletter), you can exclude those who are still in the period of receiving the course lessons.
Things to Prepare
Other than the lesson drafts, you need to get the following things ready before you run your course with MailerLite.
For the purpose I mentioned above, you need to create two different groups:
- Group 1: To be used as the trigger to initiate the email sequence. Those who are still in the period of receiving course lessons will be kept in this group
- Group 2: To host subscribers who have finished the course. In other words, these are your real audience
To start creating and running a new course, first, click the Automation menu on the MailerLite dashboard.
Click the New automation button to add a new automation.
As you can see, there are several pre-made automation templates you can choose from. Or you can also create the automation from scratch.
For this purpose, I will show you how to start the email automation from scratch. So, you can continue by clicking the Start from scratch option.
Give your automation a name and click the Start building button.
Start the automation building process by setting the trigger. As I mentioned, in our case, the trigger is when a subscriber joins a group. So, select the When subscriber joins group(s) option. Select the group (the first group) you have prepared in advance above. Click the Save button.
Next, you can add new elements to the canvas area according to your needs.
A little note. Every element in the email automation workflow is called step. For instance, when you add a new email, then you are adding an email step.
The first step you need to add, right beneath the trigger, is an email — which plays a role as a welcome email. You can click the plus icon to add a new step. Select Email.
Go to the settings panel to give your email a name, set the sender’s name, and set the sender email address. You can then click the Design email button to add content to the email.
Click the Done editing button at the top-right corner once you are done editing the email to return to the automation building canvas.
Click the Save button at the bottom-right corner before you add a new step.
The next step you need to add after the welcome email is Delay.
Click the plus icon below the email and select Delay.
Set the delay to 24 hours (or any duration of your choice).
Next, you can add an Email step, which you use to host the first lesson.
Beneath the above email, you can add a Delay step. You can set the delay duration according to the first duration of first delay (ideally 24 hours).
Repeat the steps until the last email/lesson.
Beneath the last email (the last Email step), you can add an Action step.
Set the action to Move to group(s) and select the origin group (the first group you prepared above) and destination group (the second group you prepared above).
Here is an example of workflow of a course consisting of 6 lessons and a welcome email.
Once done adding the actions, you can switch the toggle on the settings panel to activate the automation (the course).
Congratulations! Your course is now running.