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Lessons learned from onboarding emails with no HTML styling

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Re: Lessons learned from onboarding emails with no HTML styling

#51

Post by hrktb »

pau_alcala wrote: post #31
hjanssen wrote: post #9

To add to the points others have made: If I see an email with a name in the title I don't recognize, I instantly think it is spam. Please do not do this, it neither helps with your credibility nor does it help to build a "connection". I want to know where this email is coming from, and if I have signed up at Spotify, I expect to recieve my emails from Spotify, not Tom whoever at Spotify.

Interesting point there. Does the same happen to you with smaller or earlier companies? I wouldn't trust Tom from Spotify is a real person, but some companies have founders sending and replying to those emails themselves. A good practice I saw from another onboarding sequence was Apollo.io's first email. It was from a person who told me they would be my point of contact if I needed anything from the company. I know i…

I think the difference is less on small or big company, but wether it’s an open topic or not.

You don’t want a password reset confirmation mail from Andre, or in this case a simple account creation notification from Tom.

If it’s a full onboarding email where you are invited to have questions and interact further, sure, why not, assuming all following mails will be from Tom as well. Otherwise the mail having personality is just noise and abusing people’s social behavior.

I feel the same with mails addressing me on a first name basis. It’s skating on very thin ice, and I hate most companies doing it.

Re: Lessons learned from onboarding emails with no HTML styling

#52

Post by jariel »

arethuza wrote: post #28
hjanssen wrote: post #9

To add to the points others have made: If I see an email with a name in the title I don't recognize, I instantly think it is spam. Please do not do this, it neither helps with your credibility nor does it help to build a "connection". I want to know where this email is coming from, and if I have signed up at Spotify, I expect to recieve my emails from Spotify, not Tom whoever at Spotify.

I really dislike emails that claim to come from a person but obviously come from an automated system - I find it remarkably dishonest. Edit: I don't mind if I think the person is even vaguely aware I exist. But an email claiming to be from an executive of some huge company saying how happy they are that I have signed up doesn't fall into that category.

To me, if it's a 'real person' but an automated system it's even more dishonest.

The message is not coming from them.

I know it's not particularly disingenuous - it's just 'marketing' but at the same time it really triggers my 'Orwellian Dystopia' concerns about the completely impersonal future where relationships are utterly commoditized and we lose the ability to distinguish between man and machine.

In fact, the overly familiar tone of messages those that 'try to hard' to lack protocol bother me as well.

A 'corporation' using the language of 'friendship' is ridiculous. Sadly, I think this will go on as we love to think that 'someone who uses more casual language with us must be on more familiar terms'.

Frankly, I'd rather go back to proper titles. Mr. Ms. whatever.

"I don't know you, you are not my friend, you cannot be familiar with me, don't tell me jokes or help me 'chillax'" is what I feel like saying.

Re: Lessons learned from onboarding emails with no HTML styling

#53

Post by Aardwolf »

> Emojis in the subject (use with caution)

The only emojis I see in subject lines occur in emails in the spam box

What is the point of an "onboarding" email by the way? If you signed up on a website, can't that website show this info instead?

Receiving an email I didn't ask for (other than functional ones like verification, pdf receipt, ...) after signing up for a service also is spam to me. Especially if they come with some delay, or it start to become multiple ones

Is that not so for other people?

Re: Lessons learned from onboarding emails with no HTML styling

#54

Post by bonoboTP »

I really hate these cheesy lines that are "excellent" according to the article, like:

- "You had enough fluff marketing content and so did we. So the absofreakinlutely BEST thing you could do right now..."

- "Writing this from my couch at home, hoping to find you safe and well at yours. It's been a busy summer! I wanted to share more about out 2.9 release..."

No, just no. Leave me alone, we aren't friends, you did not write this to me personally. When I read such text I am mentally bracing myself and putting up my defenses because we are at war. You are fighting in the arms race in the attention economy at my expense. This kind of email is like mimicry in the animal kingdom. You are faking the appearance of a mail from a friend when it's a business. It's nasty, parasitic and off-putting.

But maybe it's a cultural difference. Perhaps American culture is more receptive to this. But in most European cultures politeness requires a certain distance and being overly enthusiastically friendly makes us immediately think you are a scammer (in real life too). So pay attention to local cultural customs because these kinds of fake-cheerful-friendly-informal mails don't work everywhere.

Re: Lessons learned from onboarding emails with no HTML styling

#55

Post by Izkata »

leephillips wrote: post #4

I disagree with the premise of the article: “Every SaaS company must start their onboarding sequences with a welcome message that is sent when a user joins the platform. This is a must by now, since everyone who signs up will expect some sort of confirmation of their transaction.” These emails invariably waste my time. They repeat what the website already told me when I signed up. If I sign up for your SaaS, I expect…

Some sort of email is absolutely necessary though. Preferably confirmation before creating the account, but I know of several that do this instead of confirmation - because someone else used my email address.

Re: Lessons learned from onboarding emails with no HTML styling

#56

Post by scintill76 »

OCISLY wrote: post #43
emojiSpam wrote: post #12

I have never received any important email with emoji in the subject. Actually, I find them so unprofessional that I send them straight to spam.

Good point. If someone sends you valuable information, he don't have to try to steal your attention with such cheap tricks.

Counterpoint: eBay order updates use emoji in the subject. I don’t necessarily like it, but it could be considered important email.

Re: Lessons learned from onboarding emails with no HTML styling

#57

Post by Izkata »

emojiSpam wrote: post #12

I have never received any important email with emoji in the subject. Actually, I find them so unprofessional that I send them straight to spam.

Not just unprofessional, actual spam is the only place I've ever seen this. It's the clearest signal to me to delete without reading.

Re: Lessons learned from onboarding emails with no HTML styling

#58

Post by petercooper »

diarrhea wrote: post #50
petercooper wrote: post #41

These emails are minimally styled HTML emails rather than "plain text" (in the original email text/plain sense). If there are links using normal text (rather than just autolinked URLs) or a logo, it's HTML – so deliverability or privacy arguments based around being "plain text" don't entirely hold up. Now, do I think there are accessibility and privacy benefits to be had by sending truly plain text email? Absolutely.…

In an ideal world, I would like to write plain Markdown and send an email off like that, with conversion to HTML happening in the background. A suitable Thunderbird addon for this [1] seems abandoned. Formatting HTML is a real struggle for me in Thunderbird's WYSIWYG editor. On the other hand, using plain-text lacks in readability (lists, short links instead of full URLs, headers, quotes, ...). [1]: https://addons.th…

It's more for newsletters than normal day to day email but Swizec Teller (a regular here) made https://techletter.app/ which may be of use to some with Markdown to email needs. It even drags in tweets, code, and so forth and renders it without you doing anything.

Re: Lessons learned from onboarding emails with no HTML styling

#59

Post by leetrout »

arethuza wrote: post #28
hjanssen wrote: post #9

To add to the points others have made: If I see an email with a name in the title I don't recognize, I instantly think it is spam. Please do not do this, it neither helps with your credibility nor does it help to build a "connection". I want to know where this email is coming from, and if I have signed up at Spotify, I expect to recieve my emails from Spotify, not Tom whoever at Spotify.

I really dislike emails that claim to come from a person but obviously come from an automated system - I find it remarkably dishonest. Edit: I don't mind if I think the person is even vaguely aware I exist. But an email claiming to be from an executive of some huge company saying how happy they are that I have signed up doesn't fall into that category.

Also the odds that Ivan at Notion is using "mail.notion.so" .... umm no.
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