Big Buttons

Fingers are much less precise than mouse pointers. Make it easier for your mobile subscribers to open and click by making buttons fat finger friendly.

Space Between Clickable Elements

Another problem that arises when you’re using a finger instead of a mouse is clickable elements placed too close together, resulting in mis-clicks. By adding additional white space between clickable elements, you can reduce the likelihood that users will find themselves waiting for the wrong page to load.

Important Information Visible Without Scrolling or Enlarging

When you have dozens of emails to catch up on, it’s important that you are able to grasp the main idea quickly. Test your email messages on a mobile device to ensure that font sizes are readable and that the user doesn’t have to scroll either vertically or horizontally to see your main message and call to action.

Single Columns

HTML is much less flexible than CSS when it comes to re-ordering columns and content blocks. Make it easy on yourself and on your subscribers by sticking to a single column that will display appropriately on a mobile screen.

Hide Unnecessary Content

It’s great to include social sharing buttons, links to your social media pages, and other secondary content in your email messages. But on a mobile device, all that extra content makes it more difficult for your subscribers to get the main message. Make mobile emails easier to scan and read by hiding images, text, and other content that isn’t strictly necessary.

As you’re designing new email campaigns for 2012, eConnect Email offers flexible design options, image management, templates, and inbox previews to help ensure that each message displays exactly as intended. By catering to the unique needs of mobile users, you can ensure that an increasingly mobile audience will continue to read and interact with your messages.

Having dealt with such problems for a while, we’ve learned some tricks and tips. We’d like to share those with you. So, here are some simple steps to follow to fix broken email code.

MsoNormal

Using Microsoft Word is one of the easiest ways to mess up a perfectly coded email. You can lose hours and hours of work simply by copying and pasting your text into Word. The great thing is, Word is the simplest mistake to catch and fix. Open the source of the email (using WYSIWYG or some other editor), and run a search for “mso-”. Nearly every special CSS attribute that Microsoft Word creates begins with “mso-”.

This problem can be avoided quite easily. Simply paste any text you’re copying from Word in Notepad. Then you can copy the text from Notepad into the editor you use. That way you’ll make sure there you don’t have any lingering Word classes.

Floats, Background Images, and Boxes

“float” is a very common CSS attribute. Generally, it is found on “<div />” tags. Unfortunately, in emails, these aren’t actually a good idea. Web developers use floats all the time. And if you’re a web developer, you might find yourself wanting to sneak float into emails. The truth is, float can ruin any good template. It isn’t supported in email creation.

Background images may look cool, but they’re dreadful to work with. In fact, they simply don’t work in email. Just avoid them, and you won’t have trouble.

Then again, “<div />” tags are partially supported and very unreliable, rendering totally different in just about every email client. There are even a few email clients (such as Lotus Notes) that totally remove them. Some email clients even strip them out!

Margin

Margin may seem like a simple thing, but it can cause a huge headache! At times it works great. Other times it quits working quite unexplainably. So, want to avoid problems? Take the margin out of your email and leave it out. If an element requires a margin set it at “margin-top:0px”. If you do that, the first paragraph tag will sit at the top of the table, and so on. You won’t lose any cushioning room by removing the margins, since they’re made to overlap in the first place. For spacing, especially vertical, use tables.

Why does the color disappear?

Color can be a strange attribute that comes and goes. Sometimes you’ll see the nice bright red headings. Sometimes you’ll be back to the boring black that you tried to get rid of. Don’t panic if this happens. There’s a solution.

First try to adjust the placement of the color attribute in your inline style. Try moving it backward or forward one attribute. To make doubly sure that it appears, add the style to a <style /> tags. Assuming the inline styles for your email clients strip the <style /> and <head /> tags, you won’t hurt anything by adding it.

Table Cell Spacing

As we mentioned in the third step, you should be relying on tables for most of your spacing. What wasn’t mentioned there is that table cells can be pretty irregular in size. In several email clients, the empty <td />, no matter what its width or height attributes, comes out meaning “Don’t render me!” Stranger still, a <td /> tag containing an image that is shorter than the font height and has a height declared will elongate itself to your font height. (Confusing enough to read, and to figure out!)

Here’s a simple trick for solving these problems. Use whitespace images. Make an image that is the height or width you need, and put it in your cell. The image doesn’t have to be of anything. It can just be the background color!

Conclusion

Of course, this has barely touched on all the things that it could have, and all the problems that could possibly crop up in coding. I hope, however, that these five quick steps prove helpful in figuring out the nightmares of cross-client work.

Don’t stop here. We’re continually expanding our list of unsupported attributes and tags. Check it out and make sure there aren’t any other rules you’re breaking. If you don’t have it email us.

Best of luck! Don’t forget you can always contact us for help.

• Deeper Customer Engagement

By engagement, I mean two-way conversation. Email marketers must focus more stringently on involving subscribers in dialogue, speaking with them, rather than at them.

• Relevant Content

List segmentation will take top priority in 2012 as subscribers expect email messages to increasingly reflect their personal preferences and needs. Creating targeted lists based on subscriber behavior such as email clicks, website browsing, and previous purchases will enable businesses to send content that remains high on the subscriber’s priority list.

• Mobile Optimization

As people increasingly use mobile devices to check email, businesses will need to create messages that acknowledge the unique aspects of mobile design. Single columns, larger fonts and buttons, and increased space between clickable elements all make emails easier for mobile users to navigate.

• Automated Campaigns

While many businesses already use triggered responses for email receipts and welcome letters, automation will gain a whole new level of sophistication in 2012. Increase customer engagement with your brand by using automation for cross sell and up sell offers, birthday/anniversary greetings, purchase recommendations, and more. By utilizing multiple triggers for your automation campaign, you can keep loyal subscribers engaged on a consistent basis.

• Social Media Integration

No longer will email and Facebook operate in parallel universes. Social sharing will become an intrinsic part of email marketing strategies in 2012 as businesses seek to create multi-channel communication. Enabling subscribers to share message content via social media icons will increase the likelihood of your message reaching an ever broader audience of targeted prospects.

• Email Marketing Becomes More Important, Not Less

Ultimately, despite speculations that email is dead, email marketing will gain greater importance in 2012 than ever before. Email messages will be more personal and relevant based on subscriber data, making them an integral part of a multi-pronged approach to overall customer engagement.

eConnect Email remains on the cutting edge of email marketing technology and stands ready to help you incorporate these vital elements into your strategy. By starting out on the front edge of evolving email technology, you’ll be ready for whatever new developments 2012 brings your way.

To ensure that the link will be visible to your recipient, use the following steps:

1.    If you’re already using a <style /> tag in the <head /> of your email just tack on this line of code:

#ForceOutlook2010BroswerLink span { padding: 0px; }

2.    If you aren’t using <style /> tags or prefer a cleaner method just place this span tag in the <body /> of your email:

<span style=”padding: 0px;”></span>

While nothing else seems to have changed much with Outlook 2010, and this change seems to be a small one, it is at least proof that things may be heading in a better direction.

Subscriber #1: The Newbie

• Profile: This subscriber has just expressed interest in your company by signing up for your email list.
• Email Type: Send the newbie a welcome email that makes him feel appreciated and that encourages him to engage immediately.
• Email Goals: Encourage a first purchase, educate him about your company, promote your website, and let him know you’re glad he’s on board.
• Email Approach: Thank him for signing up and offer him a discount off his first purchase. This is also a great time to let him know what benefits he can expect to receive as a member of your subscriber list.

Subscriber #2: The Supporter

• Profile: This is the loyal gal who loves to shop at your store and opens every email you send.
• Email Type: Respond to the loyalty of this customer by giving her the VIP treatment. Make her feel like a valued customer and she’ll reward you with return visits and recommendations.
• Email Goals: Encourage increased purchasing, offer excellent customer service, and increasing loyalty
• Email Approach: Offer sneak previews for upcoming sales, give special valued-customer discounts, target email creation based on viewing history, send abandoned cart reminders, and provide immediate customer service interactions when appropriate.

Subscriber #3: The Bystander

• Profile: This person has been a member of your email list for a while but has no recent purchases and may fail to open or click on any of your email campaigns.
• Email Type: Seek to win back the loyalty of this subscriber with special offers and “we miss you” messages.
• Email Goals: Jump start re-engagement, understand her concerns, and keep her from transferring loyalty elsewhere.
• Email Approach: Solicit comments by asking for social media involvement or survey responses, offer incentives for purchases or website visits, and seek to make her feel like a valued member of your list.

The goal of lifecycle marketing is to segment your subscriber list based on their customer behavior and then to create targeted emails that encourage greater levels of participation. eConnect Email can help you reach these goals by managing subscriber data, analyzing list metrics, and building segments based on custom criteria.

Upon opening the message, I discovered that the image did not display in my email browser and there were no text tags to give me clues about this fantastic sale. Not even a link to the website. Being a sucker for fish sales, I typed fishstore.com into my browser and came up with nothing. After trying a .net extension and landing on a fish taxidermy site, I Googled said store and discovered that their website was “fishstore.us.” Okay. But here’s the real kicker. Nowhere on their site could I find anything about a Fourth of July Blowout Sale. Slightly disgruntled, I closed the tab and deleted the email.

So what’s the takeaway from this experience? I think there are several things to be learned about what to do and what not to do as you’re developing an email marketing piece.

1. Subject lines aren’t everything. We tend to talk about them like they are the holy grail of email marketing, but a fantastic subject line accomplishes nothing if it’s not supported by the email itself.
2. Always, always, always include alt text tags and links that communicate your message even if your image fails to display.
3. Don’t forget to include a link to your landing page in the body of the email, especially if your website has a weird extension like .us.
4. If you’re going to send an email about a sale, make sure sale information can be easily found on your website.
5. If you’re advertising a blowout sale, it better really be a blowout. If it’s not, people will begin to be skeptical of your email pieces and may skip them altogether.

Creating a stellar email goes beyond dotting all your i’s and crossing your t’s. You need a certain amount of creativity in order to be in touch with what will speak to your target audience. eConnect Email can help you design customized email templates, organize and integrate images, and test your emails before sending to ensure that they display correctly and accomplish the goals you have in mind. Don’t make the mistake of losing customers to a poorly designed email. Take the time to work out the kinks before you send, and you’ll not only increase sales, but also build loyal customers who look forward to your messages.

When Video Is Better Than Text and Images Alone

Just because you can use video within an email doesn’t necessarily mean you should. Video should be used as a tool to communicate your message more effectively, not as a cool new gadget to impress subscribers. Specific instances in which video can be more effective than text and images alone include new product demonstrations, how-to demonstrations, and attention-grabbers.  An attention-grabber that makes someone laugh, ultimately results in that person sharing a link with a friend or visiting your site to find out more.  However, attention for its own sake usually isn’t helpful.

How to Use Video in Your Email Campaign

There are two primary options for adding video into your emails: embedded video and linked video. Embedding the video into your email is NOT recommended, as it’s extremely problematic and not widely supported.  In addition, embedding video directly into your email campaign will can also cause it to be mistaken for spam. Embedded videos also make it impossible to track the effectiveness of the campaign since you have no way of determining how many subscribers tuned in to actually watch the video. For these reasons, the better option is to use a linked screenshot in the body of the email instead. By clicking on the image, viewers will be directed to the location of where the video is hosted, enabling you to track click-through rates much more accurately.

Tips for Success with Video Email Marketing

Ultimately, your success with integrating video into emails will depend on how well you can merge the video element with text and images for better overall persuasion. Here are some tips to get you started:

• Support the video with brief but compelling copy, including a strong call to action.
• Keep the video short. Videos under one minute long usually perform best in an email setting.
• Build a strong landing page that restates the message of the video and points viewers toward your call to action.

As email marketing continues to evolve, eConnect Email stands ready to help you remain on the cutting edge. If you have additional questions about using video in next email campaign let us know.

Example:

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Let The Preview Pane Work for You

Many email programs provide readers with a preview pane that shows them a snippet of the email before they open it. The good news is that this gives you a chance to reach people that might not actually click on your message if you know how to use that snippet of space effectively. The preview pane is the most important piece of real estate within your campaign so design accordingly.  eConnect Email provides templates to help you design an effective email as well as inbox previews so you can see how your message will look in a variety of different email programs.

Keep Important Information as Text, Not Graphics

Another quirk of many email applications is that they often block images by default. To make sure the largest percentage of readers see your message, put your most important information in text format rather than incorporating it into a graphic image. Then use eConnect Email’s image manager to upload images that support the information you’ve already communicated through text.

Make Your Messages Mobile Friendly

As more and more people check email on their mobile devices rather than from their computers, the need for mobile friendly formatting has become essential. If subscribers can’t clearly read your email, they’ll likely delete it before you have a chance to make that vital first impression. Start by using succinct subject lines with the most important information first and make sure your sending name is recognizable. Incorporate alt tags for your images so viewers can still see text even if images are blocked. You can also include a link to a mobile version of your email.

Choose Your Colors Wisely

Choose colors that work together and that promote the emotions you want to convey. In addition, use dark text on a light background to make your messages more readable. Take advantage of eConnect’s custom design services to help you choose colors and a format that will best convey your intended message.

Let Us Help You

While eConnect Email provides you with a great selection of email templates to choose from, you may want to think about a custom template that will incorporate your brand more professionally and seamlessly.  We can help you design a custom template for your monthly newsletters or design a campaign for a specific event or promotion.  For more information on our custom email template design services click on the link provided or call us at (866) 596-9997.

Has Outlook Improved with the Release of 2010?

Did the release of Outlook 2010 signify a step forward in the email marketing world? Probably not. In general, most email marketers have been frustrated with Microsoft since the release of Outlook 2007 when they began using Microsoft Word rather than Internet Explorer as their email-rendering engine. Certain HTML email attributes loved by email marketers–background images, animated gifs and some CSS properties —have been unsupported when emailing Outlook users. Most of these issues remain unchanged with the release of Outlook 2010

So What Has Changed?

With the release of Outlook 2010, something must have changed, right? Otherwise, what’s the point. Yes, some things have changed but we can’t necessarily say that it’s for the better.

For one thing, if you choose to use Outlook 2010 to send and receive your emails, you’re all set. Emails received by other Outlook users will be rendered properly. Of course, most of us don’t use Outlook, so we’re still stuck in a difficult position.

Another change that isn’t so good. Outlook 2010 now offers 100 less pixels in the initial rendering space. This means when 2010 users first open your email, more of your information is pushed out of sight. The recipient needs to scroll down to see that information. If your email doesn’t initially entice the user then scrolling down probably won’t happen.  So in short, as a designer we have less space to grab the recipients attention.

What Should Email Marketers Do?

As long as you currently format your emails for Outlook 2007, you shouldn’t have to change much for the new version. Except for paying closer attention to what you put at the top of an email, just keep doing the same things.  Avoid CSS floats entirely, background images and animated gifts. And keep in mind, unless your potential clients add you to an address book, your images won’t appear on his or her screen until they download them (so make sure not to send out emails that are made up of only images).

If you have questions or run into a snag let us know, we’re here to help!