‘Design’ Articles

Many email marketers choose to use image-based emails to create a seamless and professional look for their email campaigns. You can do this too, if you know the right way to do it!

For starters, you will have to accept that initially your images WILL get blocked by the majority of email clients. Your customers can choose to accept these images later, but on initial receipt, the images will be blocked. If you understand this and the implications and you still want to use this tactic, then you are ready to proceed.

When you decide to send an image-based email, a great way to ensure that your customers hear your message is by including alternative text. Including alternative text for images is always a good practice, but becomes especially important when there is no other content for your recipients to see such as in image based emails. Alternate text will show up when an image is blocked and your customer will at least be able to read that small part of your message. This text can assure recipients that the email is from a trusted source and they will be more likely to view the images after reading it.

It is extremely simple to provide alternative text for your images with the Admail.net system. All you need to do is include your alternative text in the “Image Description” when you add the image to your message. If you are going to use HTML code to construct your email, you probably already know that you can include alternative text through the “alt” tag.

Another way to keep your image-based emails manageable is to avoid using one large image file. It is more prudent to slice the image into several pieces and then construct the image out of these pieces. Why is this a commonly followed practice? For two reasons: Primarily, because it makes the message more likely to be viewed. Several small files allow for an opportunity to include more alternate text and reduce the chance of tripping spam filters. Secondly, slicing allows you to make each individual section of your image a clickable link. Remember, image map code does not work in most email browsers, so slicing becomes a great alternative. We encourage best practices such as slicing at Admail.net. That is one of the reasons why our default image upload size is 40kbs or less per image.

Slicing an image is a fairly simple process that can be carried out by your company’s graphic designer or anyone who is competent with photo editing software. You can also do it online here: http://www.chami.com/html-kit/services/is/ Make sure you uncheck the boxes that say ‘enable links’ and ‘mouse over effect’ unless you are an advance user. After making any changes on this page, including unchecking these boxes, you must click the “process” button for the changes to take effect. Once you’ve made your changes, click download. You’ll be prompted to download a zip file which will contain your slices.

Now that you have a sliced piece of artwork that you would like to send,  you may be wondering how to turn it into an email. The best way to handle imaged-based email creation is to have an experienced website designer or someone very familiar with HTML create a simple layout and then import it into our system. Another possibility is to modify a template for your needs. Simply insert the images in the arrangement you would like them to be. We suggest that you use as few slices as possible to keep this manageable. Slicing the image in half is usually enough. Through our own testing we’ve found that anything over four slices begins to get pretty complicated. You may need to change individual image alignment to get images to lay flush against one another. When you have one image above another you’ll see that there will be a space between the two. Align the image on top with using the alignment tag “bottom.”

If you are unfamiliar with the more advanced editing features of Email Builder 2.0, we highly suggest that you experiment with the system. By right-clicking on the layout view of the template, you can access a host of options that let your modify the template. You can copy sections and you split them into additional columns. Padding changes can be made by right clicking and choosing the modify option in the drop down. After a little experimentation, you should have a firm grasp on the layout editor, if not, you’re welcome to call us and we’ll be more than happy to walk you through it!

A great example of alternative text and slicing done right.

You don’t have to be a programmer, developer, or graphic designer to be a good email marketer. You certainly don’t have to be a wiz with CSS or Javascript. Good email marketing requires nothing more than an employee who understands their customers and who can provide valuable content. That being said, having a basic understanding of the technology you are dealing with can be a great help and it may just save you from some serious technology induced headaches.

When something goes wrong and your email doesn’t look or function the way you want it to, what do you do? Many email marketers use HTML creation programs like frontpage, dreamweaver, or other template based systems to create good looking emails with little to no knowledge of HTML. These can be extremely helpful tools but they don’t always translate perfectly to email. So when a problem does arise where will you turn?

By learning some rudimentary HTML code you could solve many of these problems yourself. I’m not suggesting you spend days or even weeks to become an expert or even to memorize any code. If you’d like you could simply print out this blog or any of the more complete HTML cheat sheets online, and use it as an instant reference. At any rate, understanding some basic HTML code and finding out how it all functions will give you a valuable tool set and make you a greater asset in the workplace.

I’ve listed and explained some of the most simple and common HTML tags here.

<p>: This indicates the start of a paragraph, as with all HTML code the tag must be closed after the element is complete. Therefore at the end of a paragraph you would complete the tag by putting a closing tag like so </p>

Example: <p>This is my newest email!</p>

<img src=”insert location here” />: This is the appropriate tag to insert an image into html. Note that if you use a image location on your local machine others will NOT be able to view it. This problem occurs when using pictures from your computer in frontpage and then copying that HTML code. You will be able to see the pictures but no one else will. You need to use a location that is hosted somewhere on the web, in my example you will see that I used a image hosted on Admail.

Example: <img src=”https://www.admail.net/thumbnail/154/”></img>

<a href=”insert internet address here”>link </a>: This is the HTML tag to create a link. The word or phrase in-between the opening and closing tag will be made into the link.

Example: <a href=”http://www.admail.net”>Visit Our Website!</a>

Other tags include <b>, this will make your font bold, and <i>, which will make your font italic.

These are very rudimentary tags but they will help you understand some of the more simple elements of HTML. For those interested in learning more, websites like www.w3schools.com provide an online knowledge base and free online training.

Armed with this knowledge you will have a better grasp of your medium and, with a bit of study and training, you may be able to troubleshoot your own problems, saving you and your company valuable time.

To recap:

<p>: Paragraph </p>
<img src=”/>: Image
<a href=”>: Link </a>
<b>: Bold </b>
<i>: Italic </i>

Thaddy Claus (Thaddeus) is tying the bow on our seasonal present for our customers. With the arrival of Email Builder 2.0 we hope to answer some of your email marketing holiday wishes. Email Builder 2.0 is an improved version of our already powerful template system. It has many new features, of which include:

1. Controls and editing tools that are more familiar and more accessible for users.
2. Emails are now saved more often and the “Resume Last Email” function allows users to #  Admail Services # design # Email Marketing # HTML # Ncome back to work they may have previously lost.
3. Templates are easier to modify and format. Changes to background color and field sizes can be made with simple drop down menus.
4. Undo and redo buttons have been introduced.
5. Images are now easier to re-size. Images can be formatted by dragging the edges until it meets the desired height and width. (Not available in Safari)

Email Builder 2.0 provides these features and many more! We at Admail.net look forward to the New Year and the full implementation of Email Builder 2.0. If you’d like to try the beta version, please select the beta category when choosing a template in Email Builder. *Please note bugs may be present that will not be included in the final release.