AutoResponse Plus

Previous  Top  Next

The integration with ARP works similar to the other third party tools. You install it by entering the file system path in the Advanced Shop Parameters in your AShop Administration Panel (update.php must be run first in old AShop installations to add the new database fields) and then you can select one of the autoresponders in a drop down list on the Add/Edit product/subscription pages. Whenever a customer buys one of the products he/she will automatically be added to the corresponding autoresponder and receive the first follow up message.

There is one thing that can cause trouble with the ARP integration. An open basedir restriction will prevent the AShop scripts from reading the ARP config file. To fix this...

Copy the config file (it is called arp3-config.pl) to another directory, such as httpdocs, where it can be read from php. Set the AShop third party software configuration (set in the Advanced Shop Parameters) to this path. It needs to be an exact copy of the actual config file that is used for ARP on the site.

OR

Add the cgi-bin directory to the open basedir in the httpd.include file for the domain.

For example: /home/httpd/vhosts/yourdomain.com/conf/httpd.include

   

There are two methods of signing up with an ARP autoresponder. You can either use an html form or simply send an email to an address that is connected to the autoresponder. The email is the unique identifier of each autoresponder in ARP, which is why it is used in the drop down list within AShop Administration Panel > Edit Products for each product. To be able to use the email method a mail filter needs to be installed which runs an ARP script automatically when a message is sent to a certain address.

Note: See ARP instructions for installation of ARP and mail filters.

You don't need to have a mailbox for each email address that is to be used in ARP. You can simply use the catch all option in the server administrator, and you don't need to use the email sign up method of ARP at all to be able to use it together with AShop. No additional configuration or setup other than what is described in the install.txt of ARP is needed for the AShop integration but if you want the email sign up method you must create a mail filter.

The first ARP message will be sent immediately when customers purchase associated products. Cron jobs must be setup for ARP to automatically send subsequent messages.

Note: If ARP is installed in a subdomain, add the subdirectory path extension to 3 of the fields in the arp3-settings.pl script file. For instance: /dir/subdir

Troubleshooting Tips

Internal Server Error When Running ARP
It seems like the most common problem with cgi scripts is that they have the wrong type of linebreaks (Windows instead of Unix). This might happen when you upload the scripts with ftp in binary mode instead of ascii mode.

Tips for AutoResponse Plus Users

Sending new messages to subscribers who have already finished the sequence
If you add new messages to a follow-up sequence and want "Finished"
subscribers to get those new messages, here's the process:

1.	Set autoresponder status to "Suspended".

2.	Add your new messages.

3.	Set autoresponder status to "Active".

4.	Filter subscriber list by autoresponder and status "Finished"

5.	Use Subscribers > Group Tasks > Edit to set their status to "Active" en masse.

They will be added back into the sequence and carry on from where they left off.

After they have received the new messages, they will be re-flagged as "Finished".

Note that the above will only work if messages are added at the end of the sequence,
not in the middle of it.