111–120 of 178 posts
Since 'pau_alcala is here, what does this mean? > "Zest win the contest of better subjects seding thing like: " It just doesn't parse for me. Perhaps: > "Zest wins the contest for better subjects, such as:" But even that sounds a little weird?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Perhaps American culture is more receptive to this As an American I don't think people like corporations feigning social intimacy either.
But it happens all the time (according to my tiny sample size). A tong time ago, I was in an American coffee shop (probably Starbucks, I guess), and they asked for my name. I found that very strange and weird. You would neither be able to spell or pronouce it, so let's just go with James. This trend is beginning in Denmark as well, and I don't like it. It'd be easier for everyone if you just assign me a number and an…
(1) may not speak English (analogous scenario: imagine going to a Starbucks in Japan and having the cashier repeatedly ask for your name in Japanese, and you don't speak Japanese);
(2) have names that aren't easily pronounced/spelled in English ("Name?" "Zbigniew" "How do you spell that?" "Zed bee eye gee...." "Wait, what's zed?" "Last letter of alphabet" "Oh you mean zee" "No, zed");
(3) feel embarrassed about the whole interaction, which leads to them inventing a fake name, which in turn makes them feel dirty. (Zbigniew gives his name as "Zach" to the Starbucks employee although he has never used this name in his life -- it's not the name his parents gave him)
(4) then has said name confused with 3 other Zachs also waiting for their tall lattes.
It's almost like someone forgot to think through the UI/UX of this system with respect to internationalization.
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 no…
Tech companies are often stupid, but not THAT stupid. Most of the strategies in this article do improve open and conversion rate.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm American and agree with the GP 110%. If I get an email like that, not only do I delete it, but I'm less likely to read your future emails. I think it is a California-centric "it's all good" vibe. Not all of America has California culture.
California native (east bay) checking in. These fake ass, liposuction, collagen injected carnival exhibit emails are bullshit. You should delete them and the companies from your life.
In this thread: lots of grumpy people forgetting that if you’re on HN you are weird and not representative I email 10,000+ engineers 3x+ per week. Individually they’re all grumpy and ugh about email. En masse, only 0.01% of them unsubscribe and 24%+ read the emails. Many even email back saying how wonderful they are. And yes adding emojis to both subjects and emails themselves helps. The open and engagement rates imp…
I run a SAAS and still personally (non-automated) send a welcome /check-in/onboard email to every single signup. I've sent a 1000+ in the last year. I try to make them really personalized. Like if your website is acmewidgets.com - I'll put "Acme Widget Help?" as the subject. My own takeaways: 1. Plain Text for sure 2. Super short - my standard sort of email is now about 3 sentences. 3. Ask a question - in my case the…
This is exactly what I do to. I get around a 15% response rate, which I'd thought was pretty good before reading your 30% - though TBH I've no idea what might be expected?
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 no…
None of our opinions matter though. We are not the target market usually. If the change in tone drives more business then it works. Now you could make the argument that ethically this mimicry (I like that term you used) is morally wrong. Its interesting because when you go to a coffee shop and they act friendly and helpful we like it and dont think about if they genuinely are our friends. I think if the tone is paire…
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 no…
“No wireless. Less space than a Nomad. Lame.”
And
“For a Linux user, you can already build such a system yourself quite trivially by getting an FTP account, mounting it locally with curlftpfs, and then using SVN or CVS on the mounted filesystem. From Windows or Mac, this FTP account could be accessed through built-in software.”
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Perhaps American culture is more receptive to this As an American I don't think people like corporations feigning social intimacy either.
But it happens all the time (according to my tiny sample size). A tong time ago, I was in an American coffee shop (probably Starbucks, I guess), and they asked for my name. I found that very strange and weird. You would neither be able to spell or pronouce it, so let's just go with James. This trend is beginning in Denmark as well, and I don't like it. It'd be easier for everyone if you just assign me a number and an…
This must have been Walmart. I always figured they had greeters because the small town Protestant church from my childhood had greeters.
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…