Comments on: a word on e-mail http://www.cheezhead.com/2006/04/12/a-word-on-e-mail/ Insight and opinion from the world of employment. Mon, 13 Oct 2008 16:49:42 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5.1 By: Catherine DaGrossa http://www.cheezhead.com/2006/04/12/a-word-on-e-mail/#comment-567 Catherine DaGrossa Mon, 17 Apr 2006 20:29:15 +0000 http://www.cheezhead.com/2006/04/12/a-word-on-e-mail/#comment-567 We recently conducted four focus groups to "test" our recruitment marketing campaign and interestingly enough the people in the focus group (people who were employed in our industry and with our competitors) were put off by the HTML email we showed them. Their feedback was it felt too "spam-like" and that they would prefer to receive such a message in text versus HTML. Also, they fetl it would get "caught" by their spam blockers. We are going to run a test a little later in the year and send an HTML version to one group and a text message to the other group and see if that open or apply rates differ significantly. Any more info on this subject would be helpful! We recently conducted four focus groups to “test” our recruitment marketing campaign and interestingly enough the people in the focus group (people who were employed in our industry and with our competitors) were put off by the HTML email we showed them. Their feedback was it felt too “spam-like” and that they would prefer to receive such a message in text versus HTML. Also, they fetl it would get “caught” by their spam blockers. We are going to run a test a little later in the year and send an HTML version to one group and a text message to the other group and see if that open or apply rates differ significantly. Any more info on this subject would be helpful!

]]> By: Steven Rothberg http://www.cheezhead.com/2006/04/12/a-word-on-e-mail/#comment-559 Steven Rothberg Wed, 12 Apr 2006 15:34:59 +0000 http://www.cheezhead.com/2006/04/12/a-word-on-e-mail/#comment-559 Great entry. A significant part of our business is delivering targeted emails on behalf of our clients to the 120 million candidates in our network's targeted email database. We deploy several campaigns a week and so I've acquired a fair amount of experience in this field over the years. I completely agree with almost everything that you've written, but disagree with your recommendation about plain text versus HTML emails. In our experience, HTML emails are opened (read) far more often and clicked through far more often, both of which lead to far more applications and hires. Your recommendation to send plain text to those who are only able to receive plain text and HTML to the rest is a good one, but you shouldn't assume that an HTML email will be delivered without its graphics if you send it to a gmail or other such subscriber. Simply test. Have your vendor or in-house list manager sign up for email accounts with all of the major consumer ISPs. Before deploying the email, test it to those addresses. Proof is in the pudding. Also, one more suggestion: always include a "tell a friend" feature. You'd be amazed how many people will click on that to forward a copy of the email to their friends if you simply ask them to do so. Yet the same people won't forward the email to their friends if not asked. It isn't that they're trying to do you a favor. It is that the idea of forwarding the email just won't occur to them unless they're asked. Great entry. A significant part of our business is delivering targeted emails on behalf of our clients to the 120 million candidates in our network’s targeted email database. We deploy several campaigns a week and so I’ve acquired a fair amount of experience in this field over the years.

I completely agree with almost everything that you’ve written, but disagree with your recommendation about plain text versus HTML emails. In our experience, HTML emails are opened (read) far more often and clicked through far more often, both of which lead to far more applications and hires. Your recommendation to send plain text to those who are only able to receive plain text and HTML to the rest is a good one, but you shouldn’t assume that an HTML email will be delivered without its graphics if you send it to a gmail or other such subscriber. Simply test. Have your vendor or in-house list manager sign up for email accounts with all of the major consumer ISPs. Before deploying the email, test it to those addresses. Proof is in the pudding.

Also, one more suggestion: always include a “tell a friend” feature. You’d be amazed how many people will click on that to forward a copy of the email to their friends if you simply ask them to do so. Yet the same people won’t forward the email to their friends if not asked. It isn’t that they’re trying to do you a favor. It is that the idea of forwarding the email just won’t occur to them unless they’re asked.

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