My inbox filled up this week from questions about how to do this and I wanted to provide an update for you.

Quite a few small businesses use Facebook as a way to host their online presence on their Pages. Within those, many leverage their Facebook for lead generation and to host their own content outside the scope of Facebook. They use the Static FBML application to do this and that was how we instructed users how to add opt-in forms to their Facebook Pages.

Unfortunately, new installs of the Static FBML app no longer permit you to place it on the Wall, located on the left side of the Wall content. Instead, the only option is to create a separate tab on the top and leverage the 720 (smaller soon, 520) pixel-wide space for your content. From what we can tell, previous implementations of the Static FBML “box” on the Wall remain — for now. Facebook indicated they intend to decimate all existing “Profile Boxes” in August.

(I have a theory as to why they want to cut off these profile boxes, but it’s pure speculation. The goal is to have more “applications” made for publishers. I’ll let you decide who benefits from these changes.)

It’s not a sudden surprise – They foreshadowed the changes ambiguously on their their now-missing Development Wiki pertaining to this capability. The only good news is the functionality remains unchanged and continues to provide value for businesses to place it on their Pages – but that will also change later in August.

I’ll update the tutorial on how to setup an Infusionsoft Web Form on Facebook and get that out to you as soon as possible. Hope this helps you and addresses the confusion of, “Why can’t I put Static FBML on my Wall?”

Your thoughts, reactions, comments?

You’ve probably seen the settings to make this happen a hundred times and just didn’t know what to do with them. First, I’ll show you what they look like.  Check out the screenshots below and then I’ll explain what to do with them.

When setting up a Web Form, check the box that says “Pass Person’s info to ‘Thank You’ page url”

When setting up traditional Trackable links, check the box to pass the person’s details to the URL

When using the new Email Builder, show advanced options on automation links and check the box to “place the person’s details at the end of the URL”

When someone fills out a Web Form, an Order Form, or clicks a Trackable/Automation Link, you can “pass the person’s details to the URL” or success page. What this means is that Infusionsoft will append every field from the person’s contact record to the URL as a Query String.

What does that mean?

Let’s say you want to send people to http://www.mywebsite.com/success.php after they fill out a Web Form or click a link. If you check the box to pass their details, Infusionsoft will add their details to the URL in a format like this:

http://www.mywebsite.com/success.php?Id=1234&FirstName=Tyler&LastName=Garns&Email=tyler@emaildomain.com

Everything after the question mark in the URL is known as the Query String. It’s a list of all of the fields and their values from the person’s contact record.

Why is this cool and important?

Well, the fields that are in the query string are accessible to the page the person is on.  You can access these values in two different ways:

1. Client Side - This means that the person’s web browser accesses the values itself through Javascript.
2. Server Side - This means that the web server accesses the values as the page is loading.

I’ll give you some simple code to capture these value using Javascript (client-side) as well as PHP (server-side) and then I’ll show you some really cool stuff you can do with this data.

Here’s how you can do it with Javascript.

In the head section of your site, place this code:

<script>
function getQuerystring(key, default_)
{
if (default_==null) default_="";
key = key.replace(/[\[]/,"\\\[").replace(/[\]]/,"\\\]");
var regex = new RegExp("[\\?&]"+key+"=([^&#]*)");
var qs = regex.exec(window.location.href);
if(qs == null)
return default_;
else
return qs[1];
}
</script>

Next, place code like this in your HTML to insert the FirstName into the website content. Of course, you can replace “FirstName” with any of the other field names to pull in other contact fields.

<script>
var first = getQuerystring('FirstName');
document.write(first);
</script>

Pretty basic, right? It’s even easier with PHP. In PHP, all Query String values exist in an array called $_REQUEST.  To access the FirstName value, just use $_REQUEST['FirstName'], to access the Email, just use $_REQUEST['Email'].  Get the values onto the screen with code like this:

<?php echo $_REQUEST['FirstName']; ?>

So, pulling this data into a page can help you personalize the page for your visitors.  But, that’s not the most powerful part. Imagine a multi-step series of questions you’d like to ask prospects, like a survey.  We’ll now you can pre-fill all forms after the first form by using this feature. Or, when you send people to a form after they’ve already opted-in, you can pre-fill the information you already have.  This does two things: it makes the process of filling out forms easier for the prospects, and it also gives them an opportunity to correct any information that may not be right.

Also, one of the fields that is always passed is the ContactId. With the ContactId you can run actions and much more on the contact record using the API. I’m not going to go into the details of the API right now, but imagine being able to send emails, faxes, voice messages, start and stop follow-up sequences, tag, etc. when someone visits a website, or clicks a particular link on a site, or interacts with a site in any way.  That’s where it gets fun.

To wrap things up, here are a bunch of ideas you can do when you harness the power of the contact data being in the Query String from Infusionsoft:

1. Personalize the page by using the person’s name in the copy
2. Personalize the page by changing the copy based on what tags may or may not be present on the person’s contact record
3. Personalize the page by changing the copy based on the person’s geographic location or certain values in custom fields
4. Pre-fill webforms
5. Track website behavior and store in the contact record (know how many pages they visit, how long they stay, etc)
6. Display special offers for people tagged as customers and a standard offer for others
7. Use the info to do all kinds of awesome stuff with the API

These are just a few of the limitless ways you can use this feature. Comment below to let me know if you’ve come up with creative ways to use the data that can be passed.

[Image credit: ladydragonflyherworld]

I hypothesize one cause of the problem is due to email marketing software is too easy. Convenience can be dangeous when anyone and their boss can send a mass email to all past, present and potential customers. Trust me when I say a lot of the email marketing services out there are very powerful and able to send hundreds of emails per second.

Don’t get me wrong – email marketing software isn’t “easy” when it comes to segmentation or launching a highly targeted email marketing and campaign. For that, it’s complex and can be mind-boggling to even the most savviest email marketer. Instead, many email marketing apps make it easy to cause big mistakes. Those mistakes can result in undesirable unsubscribes, treacherous spam complaints or even being dropped entirely by your email marketing provider. Nobody wants that, but it’s remarkably easy to do it.

So, what’s the solution? Learn and push your email marketing software to its limits. Understand how it offers segmentation, automation and know what will entice your subscribers to act. In a majority of instances, what sounds good in the morning to send might be better to send later that week  – or not even at all. Thinking like your subscriber is huge for understanding what will provide them value. In fact, eMarketer recently published a report that concludes that list fatigue (age + lack of relevance) is why most people lose interest in emails sent by businesses.

(On that note, Infusionsoft provides a ton of features within the software and plenty of excellent documentation so you can build a highly-targeted campaign for your business.)

Effective email marketers practice discipline. It takes patience to analyze the metrics and activity with their email marketing software. It takes a thoughtful leader to make decisions that support the interests of the subscriber over the business.

Like sending email at 1:30 AM to your co-workers, it’s probably a good idea to draft it up and revisit it after several hours. Your email marketing shouldn’t differ. (And yes, I have been guilty of this and my co-workers probably are nodding in agreement.)

As marketers, in our next email marketing campaign, can we commit to segment and fine-tune our list before we hit send?

How are you “aiming” before sending? Share your insight in the comments below!

[Image credit: no3rdw]

Why are YOU Infusionsoft’s biggest fan?

That’s the question we want to answer and want to hear it from you! The only thing that separates you from being crowned our Biggest Fan is a video on YouTube, an epic blog post or a detailed update on our Facebook Page. We’ll also reward two runner-ups a Flip Mino HD video recorder for the craziest and the funniest submission.

Here are suggestions to help you with your submission:

• Have you gained efficiencies or optimized your business with Infusionsoft?
• Have you had more freedom by automating painful processes of your business?
• Has your marketing improved because of Email Marketing 2.0?
• Have you conquered your own chaos of entrepreneurship with Infusionsoft?
• Has Infusionsoft supported you along the way to being successful?

How?

• Write a blog post! Be sure to add “Infusionsoft” to the tags or mention it in the title.
• Submit a Video! You can use you built-in video camera in your laptop if you’ve got one or record a video and upload it to YouTube. Don’t forget to tag the video with “Infusionsoft” after you upload it.
• Post on our Wall! We invite you to swing by our Facebook Page and write on our wall.

When you post your content about why you love Infusionsoft or how it has affected your life or your business, come back to this blog post and post a link to it in the comments below. We’ll select and announce the winner on our Blog, Facebook and Twitter. In addition, the winner be highlighted on our website so others can see why they are the Biggest Fan of Infusionsoft. (It’s also a pretty cool way to get buzz for your business.)

We’re not looking for perfection or models – we’re looking for authentic, real people like YOU who use Infusionsoft. If you benefit from using Infusionsoft, you have every reason to enter and win this contest! This contest ends Friday, July 30, 2010, so what are you waiting for?

The fine print for the Infusionsoft ‘Biggest Fan’ Contest:
Participants must already use Infusionsoft in their business. They may create as many articles of content as they wish; once an article of content is submitted, they’re eligible to win. Selection of the winner is at the sole discretion of Infusionsoft and will be based on adherence to contest rules. No additional purchase is necessary; this contest is for existing users of Infusionsoft. Odds of winning are based on the number of entries received (provided in the comments below). When submitting content, you authorize Infusionsoft to spread the word about what you think about Infusionsoft indefinitely for marketing purposes with no compensation or royalties. (But if you do want to be rewarded for referring people to Infusionsoft, check out our Affiliate Program.) Content restrictions: videos must be a minimum of one minute in length and accurately represent the entrant within them, blog posts must be a minimum of 200 words, and Facebook Wall Posts must be a minimum of 200 characters. Also, content may not contain any content that is NSFW. It’s not much to ask if you are our biggest fan and could score a year of Infusionsoft service. Now that you read the fine print, go ahead and tell us why you’re our biggest fan!

Once you published your content (video, blog post or Facebook Wall Post on our Page), post a link in the comments below. You have until the end of this week to enter. We look forward to crowning you our Biggest Fan!

[Image credit: waferboard]

I’m in New York City this Friday along with others from the Infusionsoft team for the Email Marketing 2.0 Revolution Tour. New York is the fourth stop in this nationwide tour.

Here are some of the small business marketing minds that I’m excited about connecting with who’ll be at our New York event this Friday. If you’re in the tri-state area, I recommend you come check it out.

Dr. James St. Clair
Owner of Top Dog Health He’s a veterinarian and maker of dog supplements who uses Infusionsoft for his email marketing, marketing automation. He competes with bigger brands with a super small team simply by automating lead capture and lead nurture campaigns—and he’s being creative by leveraging new channels like video. He’s speaking on the “Marketing Ninjas” panel of customers who have tips and tricks to share.

Julie Goldman
Owner of New Jersey-based The Original Runner Company. She’s the best in the business working with some of the top wedding planners and celebrity brides. She’ll talk about how she has built her business on referrals, PR and automated email marketing campaigns that nurture leads. She’s also a featured speaker on our Marketing Ninjas panel.

Ramon Ray
He’s the mind behind Smallbiztechnology.com and super-plugged in to exactly what technology small businesses need. We’re a supporter of his and excellent content. Haven’t seen him since our user conference InfusionCon two years ago, so I am especially excited to see his smiling face.

Michael Port
He’s a NY Times Bestselling author of four books including the mega-bestselling Book Yourself Solid. He’s keynoting and will share insight on what small business owners can do to increase sales. I can’t wait to hear his advice for small businesses on building credibility and trust in the market.

Scott Martineau
He’s a founder of Infusionsoft. It never ceases to amaze me how likable and super-smart Scott is. Every live event serves as further validation to this. You’ll know him when you see him—he’s the guy with the crowd of customers around him hanging on his every word like he’s some rockstar (minus the long hair). There are few others who know small business marketing as well as he does. He’ll talk about new ways to engage prospects through email marketing and multi-channel marketing campaigns.

Can’t be in New York this week? No problem. We’re hitting a different city each month—you can see the entire tour schedule here. Next month is San Diego on Friday, August 20–I’ll be there too … looking forward to a whole new set of people to get my “shy” on with. Will you be there? I’d love to hear your story, too. (You can also connect with me via Twitter: @kathysacks)

[Image credit: Francisco Diez]