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Designing a modern email

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Re: Designing a modern email

#21

Post by m_d »

Demiurge wrote: post #16
m_d wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While you may never read them, a surprising number of people do. I had an internship where my primary responsibility was composing HTML emails that went out to users on a weekly basis. If I remember correctly, the majority of our users opened the emails, and roughly 5-10% clicked on a link to content on the site. I imagine these number vary quite a bit, but for a site with a paid membership we saw a lot of traffic fr…

Yes, spam is a profitable business, that's probably why there is so much more of it than personal email.

I don't see how opt-in messages from a paid service qualify as spam.

Re: Designing a modern email

#22

Post by Demiurge »

dsabanin wrote: post #17
Demiurge wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's probably still using email for communication and not free mass media content delivery.

And how HTML in emails is getting in the way of communication? Most people use GMail as their email client, so even when they read plain text emails what they actually see is HTML email. The only difference is typeface, but you can configure that.

HTML as a technology to render plain text obviously isn't getting in the way, because it's plain text. All the features of HTML beyond that get in the way by obscuring the plain text and the information plain text conveys. In my mind, email, or text communication, is not about presentation but is about textual content. If you want to deliver media or style or a visual presentation, it's just not email. I would strongly prefer if it was a plain url or safe attachment in format that doesn't allow any kind of scripting.

Re: Designing a modern email

#23

Post by Demiurge »

m_d wrote: post #21
Demiurge wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, spam is a profitable business, that's probably why there is so much more of it than personal email.

I don't see how opt-in messages from a paid service qualify as spam.

I get a lot of opt-in messages that I didn't really opt-in for, as does everyone. How many people do you think even know what 'opt-in' is ?

Re: Designing a modern email

#24

Post by acuozzo »

dsabanin wrote: post #4
acuozzo wrote: post #3

Nobody wants to receive e-mails like this.

Well if people read them and click on the links from these emails, then you must be wrong. Surprise! Did you even read the post? If you don't want them, it doesn't mean nobody does. There's also an unsubscribe link at the bottom.

Yes, I read the entire post from beginning to end. I still wholeheartedly believe that nobody wants e-mails like this. Yes, I'm speaking in absolutes and yes, I don't give a damn.

> If you don't want them, it doesn't mean nobody does.

Correct. I chose to speak in absolutes to make a point.

> There's also an unsubscribe link at the bottom.

That's wonderful, but I'm pretty sure the terminal emulator I'm running Alpine in doesn't do automatic URL lexing...

HTML is for the WWW. Please keep it out of e-mail. Thanks.

Re: Designing a modern email

#25

Post by tmhedberg »

eli wrote: post #18
B5geek wrote: post #6

Html in email is bad.evil.wrong.stupid. When will these people get it?

Best Practices for all HTML messages is to also send a Text-Only version. Have you configured your client to prefer the text version?

Nearly all marketing messages that I receive are HTML only, not multipart. In fact, this is a problem that seems almost as if it is specific to marketing spam; ordinary people who send HTML mail seem to use MUAs that sensibly send a plain text part as well. But whatever tools marketers use to send their "newsletters" seem to be ignorant of best practices, or they just don't care about the small market segment of people who don't read HTML mail.

This is not a complaint. I don't care to read what they're sending me anyway, and the wall of visual garbage that greets me when I open one of those messages has trained me to reflexively hit delete and move on.

Re: Designing a modern email

#26

Post by snowwrestler »

na85 wrote: post #2

Perhaps a more fitting title would be "designing a modern spam message"? Those emails are exactly the kind of emails that I never read.

It's not spam if you sign up for it and want to get it. But even wanted emails need good design to be effective.

Re: Designing a modern email

#27

Post by snowwrestler »

Demiurge wrote: post #23
m_d wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how opt-in messages from a paid service qualify as spam.

I get a lot of opt-in messages that I didn't really opt-in for, as does everyone. How many people do you think even know what 'opt-in' is ?

Do you get any email you did really opt-in for? If so, just think of those.

Re: Designing a modern email

#28

Post by joshuahedlund »

> 79% of your readers spent longer than 2+ seconds looking at your email

I understand how opened emails can be tracked without javascript, via server hits to img files, but what magic allows you to track how long it was opened?

Re: Designing a modern email

#29

Post by mlnhd »

m_d wrote: post #21
Demiurge wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, spam is a profitable business, that's probably why there is so much more of it than personal email.

I don't see how opt-in messages from a paid service qualify as spam.

I frequently receive marketing emails from sites I never opted into. Either the site didn't provide a choice to opt-in or opt-out on the same form where I provided my e-mail address or they ignored my preference.

Re: Designing a modern email

#30

Post by nivla »

acuozzo wrote: post #24
dsabanin wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well if people read them and click on the links from these emails, then you must be wrong. Surprise! Did you even read the post? If you don't want them, it doesn't mean nobody does. There's also an unsubscribe link at the bottom.

Yes, I read the entire post from beginning to end. I still wholeheartedly believe that nobody wants e-mails like this. Yes, I'm speaking in absolutes and yes, I don't give a damn. > If you don't want them, it doesn't mean nobody does. Correct. I chose to speak in absolutes to make a point. > There's also an unsubscribe link at the bottom. That's wonderful, but I'm pretty sure the terminal emulator I'm running Alpine…

Curious, without HTML do you expect everyone to copy-paste confirmation and password reset links? How do you account for broken links due to message truncate or unicode rendering? What about aligning various sections of the message? Controlling the font size of header, body and footer?

HTML has as much history in emails as it does in the web. Taking HTML out of email is as hard as trying to take the Smart Phone out of phones today.

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