Although I don’t liked to send canned messages to my buyers, there are things I would like to tell every buyer after a purchase in their confirmation email, such as shipping expectations and return policies, and it would be helpful to have email template for this that I could access in my Gmail. Previously this was only possible by using Google Modules, but a new Google Labs feature now allows us to do this right from within Gmail.

Google labs are features that are not ready for official release, but are ready to be tested for functionality and popularity. To access them, go to your Gmail account and look at the top for a little green beaker, beside the “Settings” link. You can also access them by going to your Gmail settings and choosing the “Labs” tab. For some reason I can’t see the little beaker or the tab under settings on my desktop at work, though I can at my laptop, but I have suspected that the desktop is possessed for a while now. Maybe IE is the problem. Maybe it just hates me. Comment on this post if you know why I can’t see it on that one computer, will ya?

So, find yourself a nice, non-possessed computer and once you have logged into your Gmail and gone to the labs tab scroll down until you see “Canned Responses” and change the radio button to “Enable.” While you are there you can enable any other features you think you might like, such as the Forgotten Attachment Detector (prompts you if you mention attaching a file in your email, but don’t actually attach anything) and my favorite, the mail goggles (cute, but would be annoying in anything but the most extreme obsession cases) which stops you from drunk-emailing your ex-girlfriend by making you pass a series of tests before allowing you to send an email between certain hours of the wee morning.

Once you have canned responses enabled you will see a “canned responses” link available when you compose a message, or reply to one, which drops down to let you chose your desired saved email. To create your canned emails, just chose “new canned response” from the dropdown and create your masterpiece email template, then save. It will show in the dropdown list for you next time you compose an email (to an Etsy buyer after a purchase, for example) or reply.

Yay!