So I had an interesting request recently, one of course that I had never been asked before. That was if there was a Wordpress Newsletter plugin that could integrate with the Wordpress Users feature. Let’s say for example, you want to push people on your blog to register as a user, and when that user registers you want him/her to automatically be subscribed to your mailing list that’s tied to your blog. Here’s what I did…

1) Install Wordpress (haha bet you didn’t see that step coming )

2) Install the Subscribe2 newsletter wordpress plugin

In the settings for this plugin, you can specify whether or not a new registered user is automatically subscribed to your newsletter or not. Now the Subscribe2 plugin is cool, because users can manage what categories they want to be subscribed to. The plugin sends out a newsletter version every time you write a new blog post. You can also send newslettes seperate from the blog to your mailing list. The most important thing though to accomplish this integration between users and your newsletter, you must edit the Subscribe2 settings like I mentioned earlier. Here’s what the settings interface should look like:

3) Whalaaa! That’s it. All you have to really do is install this plugin correctly and make sure that you have that “Automatically” radio button checked and saved. This will automatically subscribe all your new registered users to your newsletter. This can become very convient. Instead of trying to get people to both subscirbe to your site as a user, and subscribe to your newsletter as well just have them do both at the same time so you don’t lose them!

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I’ve had a few clients ask me recently for newsletter functionality in their Drupal website. So that got me started on some research that took me a few hours before I finally came across a solution I could work with. I was particularly looking for a Newsletter functionality that would allow users and anonymous users to sign up. Much of what I was originally finding had to do with registered users only able to sign up for the newsletter. But for many that defeats the purpose. Most sites need a newsletter that is easy for all visitors of the site to join. That way, they can collect email addresses at a much quicker pace.

Simplenews – Module for Drupal

I came across the Simplenews module for Drupal. Installed it and configured it. It had good easy to read instructions for me to configure everything. It gave me the functionaity that I needed. Basically, I setup the Simplenews module and actived the “Newsletter Block” which allows visitors of the site to subscribe to my newsletter. Booyahh! Perfect! Everything setup exactly how I needed with no problems whatsoever. The Simplenews tool actually utilizes the Taxonomy module. Which means it basically creates a new category of content that you write in. That content of course, is sent via email through the newsletter to all subscribers.

Here is a list of the features:

Subscription

• Subscription to the newsletters is managed through blocks, and/or a subscription form, and/or a custom page
• Logged in users can manage their subscriptions in their account settings
• Anonymous (un)subscribers are offered a confirmation email
• Registered, logged in users can subscribe directly
• Subscription of registered, logged out users; and of unregistered users that register later, is managed

Creating and sending

• Newsletters can be sent as plain text or HTML. HTML newsletters require the Mime Mail module
• Newsletters can be managed through the taxonomy system
• Newsletters are stored in a “sent items” or “drafts” folder, depending on the send status
• Sending of mailings to large mailing lists is handled by cron (configurable)
• A single-copy test newsletter can be sent before the newsletter is sent to the mailing list

On-site display and RSS

• Links to taxonomy overview pages and RSS-feeds can be displayed in the block for published newsletters (both sent and unsent).
• Blocks are fully configurable. They can for example also show a list of recent issues of a particular newsletter

Administration

• Sent items folder, with: title, type (term), date, published, status (sent/cron/not sent), edit
• Drafts folders with the same options
• ‘Sent items’ and ‘Drafts’ view filter: view all newsletter issues, or filter by newsletter
• ‘Newsletters’ tab to create/edit newsletters (terms)
• Subscription list management: display email, username (or anonymous), status (active/inactive), delete, activate/inactivate, edit link to manage subscriptions
• Filter subscription list by newsletter and email address
• Subscription list management: import and export (active and/or inactive) subscriptions to and from the different newsletters
• Settings pages: general options page where standard settings can be set (such as a test e-mail address, from-name, from-address, cron), and settings pages for each newsletter to configure the newsletter’s block

Permissions

• administer newsletters, create newsletter, edit own newsletter, send newsletter, view links in block

Check out this module. I highly recommend it. It’s free and open source of course or else I would not praise it so much! It’s by far the best solution I could fine for a newsletter tool for a Drupal Content Management system install.

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