How to send Scribeless handwritten birthday cards with Zapier

We're advocates of handwritten communication for any occasion, but especially birthdays. Birthdays are a great time to show a customer, client or colleague how much you value them.

We hear you - as nice as handwritten cards are, they can be time consuming, expensive, and it's a pain to keep track. Even if you manage to keep on top of the data and send out birthday emails, it's hardly likely to make a huge impression.

But that doesn't have to be the case anymore. We've teamed up with Zapier to make it effortless to wish your customers a happy birthday, wherever in the world they are.

Zapier can connect a Google Sheet of your data to Scribeless, automatically generating notes in time for their birthday. We've even given you a breakdown below of how to set it up!

Getting Started

Now to get set up - here's a step-by-step guide of how to use Zapier to send recipients from your Google Sheet directly to Scribeless.

1. Visit Zapier's site and select 'Make a Zap'

2. Name your Zap
3. Set your trigger as 'Schedule', the Trigger Event as 'Every Day' and choose the time of day

4. Add an action and select 'Formatter', choose the Action Event 'Date / Time'

5. Go to 'input' and select 'ID' from the drop down
6. You need to change this format to MM/DD which can be done by selecting 'Custom' in the 'To Format' box and typing in 'MM/DD'

7. Press continue, Test & Review this action and if it works, press continue again
8. Now you will need to select Google Sheet for the next action
9. The Action Event will be 'Lookup Spreadsheet Row'

10. Link this to your Google account and connect to a Google Sheet, with your customer's information on

11. Set up action: connect the correct spreadsheet > lookup column MM/DD > Lookup value 2.ID > should this be considered a success when nothing is found? True
12. Test & Review action, if this is a success, add Scribeless as next action
13. Action Event will be Add Recipients
14. Link your Scribeless account

15. Link the relevant fields with the corresponding cells on your Google Sheet

15. Finally, link the Campaign ID and you should be good to go!

Why Do It?

But before you get started, let's go over why this is a good thing to do. Sure, it's nice to say happy birthday, but your customers and clients aren't necessarily expecting you to do anything. And that is exactly why you should! The average open rate of marketing emails is 22.7%, whereas for handwritten mail, it's up to 99% - if your competitors are sending marketing emails and you send a handwritten letter, you're far likelier to make a positive impact.

It's one thing to send a message with or after an order, but this shows they're in your thoughts even when work isn't front of mind. Demonstrating how much you value a client is likely to improve their opinion of you and your company, as well as increase valuable word of mouth referrals.

Scribeless notes are fully customizable, so no matter your corporate or personal brand, you can send out notes that represent you. Try changing up the handwriting style, note design and plenty more on the Scribeless platform. You can also take it even further: consider adding a birthday discount code, or a QR code linking to a more personal video message from you or your founder.

If you're enhancing their birthday experience and improving their perception of you and your brand, it's a win-win - so let's show you how it's done!