Autoresponder
Below you will find a quick guide to creating in CodeTwo Exchange Rules PRO a rule that will be responsible for sending an autoreply to all messages that match the defined criteria. With this feature it is possible to send automated replies (Autoresponders) to all enquiries received by the company to inform the customers about the opening hours.To create a new rule click Add in the List of rules pane. Next, provide the name for the rule in Add new rule dialog box e.g. Autoresponder and confirm by clicking OK.
The new rule Autoresponder will appear in the List of rules pane while the right pane will how the rule property tabs (Fig.1.).
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| Fig.1. Property tabs for the Autoresponder rule. |
The rule tabs i.e. Overview, Conditions, Actions, Exceptions, Options are used to tune how the rule should work. Now you need to perform a few simple steps inside the tabs in order to configure the rule.
Overview. This tab is used to provide a comment describing the rule. Also, it will be updated with data from all remaining tabs while you configure them.
Condition. In the Conditions tab choose the conditions that will trigger the rule if a message matches the defined criteria. To add a condition click Add and select the Message direction from the menu (Fig.2.). The right pane will show the properties for this condition. Because we want to send an automated reply to the messages that are incoming to the organization, select Incoming from the list. The remaining options must be unchecked (Fig.3.). That is all you need to configure in the Conditions tab to set up a simple Autoresponder.
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| Fig.2. Choose Message direction. | Fig.3. Choose the condition - incoming. |
Actions. The Actions tab is used to configure the work and contents of the Autoresponder. Click Add and choose Autorespond (Fig.4.). The right pane will show the action properties (Fig.5.). The Sender and the Recipient fields can remain unchanged, owing to which the autoresponse will be addressed to the original sender and will appear for the recipient as sent from the email address it was directed to. You can also add an attachment to the autoreply using the Attachments field. This field can be left empty if no attachment will be used. Click the link to learn more about automated addition of attachments to emails.
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| Fig.4. Choose Auto respond in the Actions tab. | Fig.5. Action properties window. |
If you want the Autoreply to have a different subject than the original email with the enquiry you need to edit the subject. Start editing the subject of the autoreply in the Subject field by clicking the pencil icon to open the subject edit dialog box (Fig.6.). If you want to keep the original subject and add your text, do so in front of or after the {Original Subject} placeholder. Remove {Original Subject} from the edit field if you do not want it to appear in the subject of the autoreply. In the example below Autoresponder phrase has been added to the original subject. With these settings the autoreply will have the same subject subject as the original message plus it will be extended by "Autoresponder".
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| Fig.6. Message subject edit dialog box. |
The Body format option can be set to HTML or Plain Text. In the example below the HTML has been chosen. In the next step start composing the body of the autoreply by clicking Edit Body. The editor window will open (Fig.7.). The navigation in the editor is similar to formatting documents in Microsoft Word. Provide the contents of the autoreply in the mail window of the editor. An example body:
"Thank you for contacting the Sales Department of ABC Inc. The office is open from Mon - Fri 8:00AM - 5:00PM PST.
Kind regards,
Sales Team"
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| Fig.7. Autoreply editor. |
Click the Save & Exit button to save the text of the autoreply.
Exceptions. The Exceptions tab is used to define the criteria for the rule that if met by a message should exclude it from processing by the given rule. Because we do not want to define any exceptions, this tab will be empty.
Options. This tab is used to define the settings related to how the program uses the rule. As we are building a simple Autoresponder rule this tab will not be modified.
The rule is ready to use. Click Save in the main window of the program to approve all recent changes. Once the rule is saved it begins to operate and all messages sent to the company will be replied to automatically with a set message with a defined subject.