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We create a lot of emails for people, brochures, newsletters, once-off invitations and more.

Usually these have a unique look and feel and require some kind of customisation, but with the world of html emails, consistency and display reliability is a hard thing to achieve thanks to the wide variety of archaic email clients being used.

This article here provides a handy little checklist of CSS items that are available to you, but it doesn’t not list the new hotmail “Live Mail” and as there are differences in the way CSS is handled we must press on.

The best article we’ve come across is written by the fantastic guys at Campaign Monitor right here. What are some of the main points we took away? We’ve distilled it way down for you anyway.

As with many things coded for cross-client compatibility the weakest link becomes the greatest determiner in what you can and can’t do in an email design. Especially as it’s extremely difficult, nigh impossible to segment your recipients based on what client they’re using. So, when it comes to sending through those shiny HTML emails Gmail and Outlook 2007 become those weak links that imform the way most of your design is hard-coded into the email. Question: So what do you do?

Answer: Table based inline css, and check the list of inline-options that you wish to use are supported (do what we did and printed off the Campaign Monitor’s article and stick it on your wall/foreheards).

Sure, you may have to spend a few more minutes adding code and feeling like a Neanderthal coder, but at least it’s going to deliver consistent brand integrity and professional results to your valued publics. Onward Ho!

~Rob

P.S. I just found this super article if you want a more comprehensive checklist when writing those HTML emails. It’s pretty old, but gives you good info on how to satisfy GMail and has some good practices in there. You know, just in case you had the itch for some helpful extra reading.

Email newsletters are the best way to maintain customer relationships on the Internet. Don’t have a newsletter? Jakob Nielsen says “If you don’t have a newsletter, then publishing one is probably the single-highest ROI action you can take to improve your Internet presence.”

If you already have a newsletter then you will find that your readers will most likely:

• Be inclined to skip the introductory blah-blah text;
• Scan the email; and
• Spend on average 51 seconds reading your newsletter.

To write a better newsletter consider these techniques Neilsen suggests:

• Make your newsletter simple;
• Highlight key terms;
• Be predictable. Keep a consistent newsletter style and delivery time;
• Use meaningful headings and sub headings; and
• Be personal and real. Relationships are not built with marketing language.

Brown Box has the expertise and service to help you maintain your customer relationships. It’s called MailBox - and many of our clients have great relationships with their customers from using it. Contact me to find out how yours can too.

~Andrew

We’ve recently installed an update to our great email broadcast software, ‘MailBox‘, that I am sure many of you are familiar with.

I thought I’d just outline a few of the key features which you might enjoy. We’re excited about many of them and know it’s going to provide you with an even better means for keeping in contact with your important publics in a professional way.

• Subscription Rules. Automatically subscribe/unsubscribe from multiple lists when person subscribes/unsubscribes from a given list. These rules are setup per list.
• CSV import file can be separated by comma or tab
• Added support for emails with long TLDs (such as .travel)
• Restructured code.
• Enhanced forward to friend
• View and click through stats for autoresponders
• New import process
• Unlimited options for sending filters
• Improved subscribe by email
• New reporting options
• Reasons for unsubscribing option added
• Subscriber stats
• Enhanced custom redirects
• Firefox compatible editor
• Send to a friend for auto responders
• Web version for auto responders
• Sending filters for autoresponders
• HTML, Text, or Multi-Format Autoresponders
• More message personalization options
• Send last message when adding new subscriber
• New interface (public and admin)
• Remove duplicates shows results
• Attachments for auto responders

To find out more about MailBox click here, or contact us. We’d love to talk.

~ Rob

Our good friends at Campaign Monitor are always such a wealth of advice. Looking on Stylegala this week we found a link to an interesting article asking if HTML forms in broadcast emails are a good thing or not.

The long and the short of it is ‘no’ because of the email client’s (Outlook/.Mac/Thunderbird/Mail etc) position that these forms can represent a security risk.

Campaign Monitor’s helpful table showed us that while the form may be displayed in all clients but Outlook 2007 *sigh*, it’s not able to be used in every case. This rather compelling research gives some concrete evidence suggesting that perhaps a way of engaging with your customers via a form is best not in your actual broadcast email.

So, instead of sending a form which will be dubiously received, at best, to your valued client’s inbox, simply present them with a link to a well formatted accessible form (here’s a good ‘how-to’ for you web guys out there) on your website. Sure to work, look good and ensure a professional credible result.

Need help on creating forms, surveys or creating and sending an email campaign? Contact us, we’d love to help.

~ Rob