Pre campaign send check list
It can be a nervous time sending out a campaign. But we have created a check list which should help calm those pre send jitters. Once you get into the routine, it will become second nature.
- Are you sending from the correct email address?
Make sure you have selected the correct email address you wish the email to be sent from. Make sure the name that accompanies the address is relevant too.
For example: Company Name Newsletter <newsletter@companyname.com> - Check your subject line.
Your subject line is very important. It needs to be short, relevant and to the point. This is going to be the first thing your recipient reads. It also is important to ISP's and spam filters as they rate incoming emails subject lines very carefully. - When are you sending your email?
For instance, if you send your email on a Saturday are your clients likely to read it? Think of the time of day too, early hours of the morning aren't the best. Check your email reports to pick out a trend when you have more open rates and less unsubscribes. As a hint, we tend to see the best open rates are received between Monday and Wednesday and sent between 8am and 4pm. - Have you formatted your plain text version?
This is often overlooked. Make sure your plain text email is as functional as possible. Your readers will love you for this. - Does your email heavily rely on images?
If yes, then maybe you should reconsider some of the graphics. A very high percentage of your recipients will not see your images by default. Make sure your images all contain an alternative text tag (alt="This is an image of something"). - Are your images loading correctly?
Make sure you have the set the correct path in the image source tag. Whilst it may work on your computer or network, make sure everyone can see it. For example:
<img src="/thisfile.gif" alt="My image" /> will not work.
<img src="http://www.yourwebsite.com/thisfile.gif" alt="My image" /> will work.
If you image is on an internal network, upload it to a server that has public access. - Check your image sizes.
You may have spent hours designing a great looking email, but if the file size is too large and takes a long time to download, people may delete the email before they see your hard work. Reduce the file sizes as much as you can, you want them to be visible as quickly as possible. - Do all your links work?
One common problem we have seen in the past is the links haven't been checked thoroughly. Before you send, make sure every link within the content is functioning correctly and as it should. - Have you tested your email?
We strongly recommend you test your email in all the popular email clients. You'll be surprised how different your email will look between them. The main players to test in are:
Web based: Hotmail, AOL, Yahoo! Mail and Gmail
Client based: Outlook, Eudora, Thunderbird, AOL, Mac Mail, Lotus Notes and Entourage - Are your address detail correct.
By law your required to include a full postal address, make sure it is listed and is correct.
