Can the Spam
Anyone with an e-mail account knows the most annoying part of e-mail is spam. If you're going to try e-mail marketing, you need to distance yourself from the spammers. The last thing you want is for customers to associate your organization with irritating spam.

The most important thing you can do is give clearly labeled opt-out information in every e-mail. Give your readers a way to remove themselves from your e-mail list. This is not only common courtesy, but is required by the federal Can-Spam Act of 2003.

HTML vs. Plain Text
This is the most basic decision about your e-mail newsletter: Is it going to be simple text or loaded with the graphics and pretty colors HTML allows? Some argue for plain text, citing faster loading times and a tendency for HTML e-mails to be mistaken for spam. Others say the benefits of graphics and color, when used tastefully, far outweigh any downside.

But the bottom line is you: What works best for your organization? What will your audience want? The visual wow of graphics or the simplicity of text? As a design company, we at b-moore opted to go with HTML. We do so much more than text, so it wouldn't make any sense to send a text-only e-mail. What makes sense for you?

Opening E-mail
The single most important factor that determines whether or not someone opens an e-mail is the "from" line. Make sure your from line is the name of your organization, not the person who sends the e-mail or some techno-jargon that doesn't mean anything. If your readers don't recognize the name in the from line they'll most likely delete the e-mail without opening it.

The second most important factor is the one you'd expect, the subject line. Make sure your subject line is helpful and gives your readers useful information.

E-mail marketing can be a cost effective solution, but it can also be a money pit. We can help you put e-mail--and your dollars--to good use.