Most of the features needed to run a successful membership site are provided by the membership software. Almost any owner of a membership site would like to include an autoresponder as one of the features. This feature has its advantages and disadvantages just like anything else. One bid problem is being uncertain whether you will ever use different membership software, or whether the membership site will last forever and you are still interested in having those opt-in leads. What do you do in such a situation? Do you use an inbuilt autoresponder or your own custom one? How do you arrive at such a decision and how do you accomplish it once you have made this decision?
I am advising that you use a separate autoresponder and membership software. These two things are separate. Using an inbuilt autoresponder means that it is highly unlikely that you will ever know how to use a different auto responder service, you won’t know if you just want to be able to log in once and send a single message from everybody who has ever bought from you, opted in for a free gift and all persons whom you have been in the membership site with.
An Aweber autoresponder should work very well for you although that is not what I use, but you have to use it separate from the membership site. This will ensure that you list of subscribers is not stuck inside the membership site when using Aweber. You will never think of moving the auto responders, or change the membership software. But you will have your list in a secure and separate location.
Another boon for using separate auto responders is that there are advanced features like personalizing name, being able to schedule your messages and follow -ups in the future. Follow up messages are send when a new person gets on your list and the other autoresponder messages can be send subsequently e.g. the following day after two days, etc.
Using this method can help you line up the autoresponder content with the actual content on your site. An example is when somebody subscribes to the site and gets a post seven days later. Then you can user the auto responder to send an email seven days after the person joined the site. These subscribers will then automatically receive a message notifying them to log in and see the newest content you have published on your subscription site. Almost all modern auto responders have this future including the wishlist.
Robert Plank has crated many profitable Wishlist Membership subscription sites. You can see how to achieve the same by going to: http://www.membershipcube.com