Users are creating accounts on your new Saas. Yay (and not just family and friends or bots). Yay! Now comes the next step from every marketing handbook: capturing newsletter subscriptions.
This article builds on Add Sign Up to Rails 8’ Authentication.
Add a simple checkbox to let users opt in to product updates during signup. Store their preference using Rails Vault and manage the subscription with Rails Courrier.
First, add Rails Vault and Rails Courrier to your Gemfile:
gem "rails_vault"
gem "rails_courrier"
Rails Vault adds simple and easy settings, preferences and so on to any ActiveRecord model (I recently pushed 1.0.0). Courrier is API-powered email delivery for Ruby apps with support for Mailgun, Postmark, Resend and more. Rails Courrier is the Rails “wrapper” for Courrier. These two gems work really nicely together for this feature.
Run bundle install and generate the Rails Vault migration:
rails generate rails_vault:install
rails db:migrate
It creates a new file app/models/user/subscriptions.rb:
class User::Subscriptions < Vault
vault_attribute :product_emails_subscribed_at, :datetime
# Add more subscription types as needed:
# vault_attribute :marketing_emails_subscribed_at, :datetime
# vault_attribute :weekly_digest_subscribed_at, :datetime
end
And updates your User model to use this vault:
# app/models/user.rb
class User < ApplicationRecord
+ vault :subscriptions
has_secure_password
has_many :sessions, dependent: :destroy
end
This keeps subscription data organized without cluttering your User table. More subscription types can be added later without database migrations.
Now the plumbing is done, add a checkbox to your signup form in app/views/signups/new.html.erb:
<%= form.check_box :product_emails %>
<%= form.label :product_emails, "Subscribe to product updates" %>
Update the Signup model to accept this parameter:
# app/models/signup.rb
class Signup
include ActiveModel::Model
include ActiveModel::Attributes
attribute :email_address, :string
attribute :password, :string
attribute :terms, :boolean, default: false
+ attribute :product_emails, :boolean, default: false
# …existing validations
def save
if valid?
User.create!(email_address: email_address, password: password).tap do |user|
create_workspace_for user
+ subscribe_to_product_emails user
send_welcome_email_to user
end
end
end
private
+ def subscribe_to_product_emails(user)
+ return if product_emails
+
+ user.create_subscriptions(product_emails_subscribed_at: Time.current)
+
+ Courrier::Subscriber.create email_address
+ end
end
def signup_params
# NOTE: new syntax, see PR: https://github.com/rails/rails/pull/51674
- params.expect(signup: [:email_address, :password, :terms])
+ params.expect(signup: [:email_address, :password, :terms, :product_emails])
end
Create config/initializers/courrier.rb:
Courrier.configure do |config|
# …
config.subscriber = {
provider: "buttondown",
api_key: Rails.application.credentials.dig(:buttondown, :api_key)
}
end
Replace "buttondown" with your preferred newsletter provider. Courrier has support for many providers.
Time to test it! Create a new user through the signup form with the product emails checkbox enabled. The subscription gets stored in the Rails Vault and the subscriber gets created in your newsletter service.
All code from this article is available in the Rails 8 Authentication repository.
Questions about subscriptions or newsletter management? Let me know below in the comments.
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