Thursday, May 31, 2007
ZOOKODA!!! One of my best finds ever!
Technically this is not freeware, but it is a free online tool. And it's my blog so I'll post whatever I want. ;-P
Ok, Zookoda is an email newsletter tool. Designed to be used in conjunction with Blogger, it will maintain your contact list, help you create your email with wizards and templates, automatically add content from your blog, and send personalized newsletters with blog content automatically on the schedule you determine.
But wait... There's more! You are not limited to using blogs as the foundation. Create your own "posts" for a newsletter from scratch. Also, the template can be completely customized including uploading your own images to a library and editing the html code directly. If that isn't enough, consider being able to track what happened to your email through a variety of reports including a weblinks report that shows how many clicks each link in your email received. Zookoda will even help you create custom subscription forms to add to your website.
There are only 2 downsides that I've found. First, the instructions/FAQ are not very helpful. For most functions this is not a problem since Zookoda is extremely easy to use. However, if you want to customize or personalize the template, the method of doing so (i.e. Zootags) is not documented well if at all. The only other downside is that if you want to change ANY information relating to the sender (including the footer that shows up on every email and has no preview), the Zookoda people have to verify your account again. They have been very quick about doing so during normal business hours, but they evidently do not work weekends. So don't make any changes to your sender information on Friday evening and expect to be able to send an email before Monday morning. (I found that out the hard way.)
Overall, 2-thumbs up, 5 stars, and all that jazz. Zookoda is awesome, and it's free!
Technically this is not freeware, but it is a free online tool. And it's my blog so I'll post whatever I want. ;-P
Ok, Zookoda is an email newsletter tool. Designed to be used in conjunction with Blogger, it will maintain your contact list, help you create your email with wizards and templates, automatically add content from your blog, and send personalized newsletters with blog content automatically on the schedule you determine.
But wait... There's more! You are not limited to using blogs as the foundation. Create your own "posts" for a newsletter from scratch. Also, the template can be completely customized including uploading your own images to a library and editing the html code directly. If that isn't enough, consider being able to track what happened to your email through a variety of reports including a weblinks report that shows how many clicks each link in your email received. Zookoda will even help you create custom subscription forms to add to your website.
There are only 2 downsides that I've found. First, the instructions/FAQ are not very helpful. For most functions this is not a problem since Zookoda is extremely easy to use. However, if you want to customize or personalize the template, the method of doing so (i.e. Zootags) is not documented well if at all. The only other downside is that if you want to change ANY information relating to the sender (including the footer that shows up on every email and has no preview), the Zookoda people have to verify your account again. They have been very quick about doing so during normal business hours, but they evidently do not work weekends. So don't make any changes to your sender information on Friday evening and expect to be able to send an email before Monday morning. (I found that out the hard way.)
Overall, 2-thumbs up, 5 stars, and all that jazz. Zookoda is awesome, and it's free!
