Communication. That’s what email is all about. The same is true whether you’re using it to apply for a job, or to seek help from customer services… or to market your product to thousands of customers. Marketing emails typically go to lots of different people using lots of different devices. Your objective is to convey […]

Websites are displayed in web browsers. Browsers, for the most part, agree on how things should work. There’s a high degree of standardisation. Emails are displayed in email clients. They do whatever the hell they want. As email developers we need to contend with patchy support for modern web technologies and a shifting landscape of […]

People like stats. People like numbers. How many points have you earned? What was your total number of steps walked last week? Was your screentime up or down? Personalised, bite-sized snippets of information are well-suited to the transient nature of email. Rambling walls of text (like this article) are not. But you know what’s even […]

Which of these statements about A/B testing is correct? A. It’s a fun little experiment. B. It’s a powerful tool which must be handled correctly. The correct answer is B. Split testing is a powerful tool. And, like all tools, it has the potential to do more harm than good if it’s not operated with […]

Electronic mail has come a long way since its humble, text-only roots. The modern medium is one rich in imagery, animation and – if you fancy it – interactivity. Until recently, interactive email could only be achieved by means of some CSS wizardy. While CSS was never actually intended for this purpose, it’s capable of […]

It’s ready. Your beautifully designed, flawlessly coded email is one click away from being fired off to thousands of customers. There’s just one problem: everyone is about to receive the same message. No, the forename which has been shoehorned into the subject line doesn’t count. It’s spray-and-pray dressed up as one-to-one. Email marketing deserves to […]

The inbox is a competitive place. Marketers strive to craft compelling subject lines which shine that little bit brighter than the rest. But only so much can be done with clever wording and look-at-me emoticons. Fortunately, Google has made the playing field more interesting. The Gmail application on iPhone and Android now supports email annotations. […]

James reads his emails on the slick new iPhone. Sarah uses Gmail and loves her ageing Android too much to say goodbye. Bob’s at work, using Outlook on a desktop PC. We’re about to send all of them a message. And we know it’s going to look fantastic. Not just for these individuals but on […]

User interaction with an email used to mean one thing – a click – while the real fun was left for the landing page. Thanks to some recent breakthroughs, that no longer needs to be the case. It’s now possible to offer sophisticated user interaction within the email itself such as menus, carousels, triggered animations, […]