This report is mainly for my fellow newsletter publishers. Non-publishers can read it to see how a single overlooked fact can cost a company a lot of money, year after year.
"All guns are loaded." We learn this from early age. Don't aim an "unloaded" gun at anyone and then pull the trigger. My mother's cousin was taught this rule by his father. He forgot it only once: the day he shot his father dead.
There are comparable rules in every field. Here is a big one in my life: An editor or an ad copywriter must write an e-mail document on a 14-inch screen, 800x600 pixels. Why? Because the business world is moving to laptops and notebook computers with 14-inch screens. Write the letter -- and make the layout person format the letter -- on the smallest screen commonly in use by readers. Be sure you see on your screen exactly what the reader sees on his.
This rule must be applied to ads. Problem: The people who write the ads are not the people who format the ads to be mailed out. This simple, universally ignored fact costs Internet publishers millions of dollars a year . . . and also hurts ad copywriters, who get short-changed on their commissions.
The rule is almost universally broken, and it costs publishers millions of dollars a year in lost income. Why? Because they are on the cutting edge. They use 19-inch screens or 21-inch screens on the latest desktop computers. They set their screens at 1024x728 pixels. Rule: If you live on the cutting edge, you may die on the cutting edge. (A man I know sells used professional video equipment, cheap. His company's slogan: Trailing-edge technology.)
The great irony is that leading-edge technology (laptops) use trailing edge screens (small). That is what has made my ancient, plain-text newsletters readable on-screen. They give me a huge advantage over my "latest & greatest" peers.
E-letters and ads must have wide margins in order to be read on small screens. Why? Because most business people use the Folders box, which uses up 25% of an e-mail program's screen. This is not a problem on a 19-inch desktop computer screen. It is on a 14-inch laptop computer screen.
On a 14-inch screen, Folders eats up about 15% of most HTML-coded letters. They don't fit on the screen. Folders eats up zero percent of a plain text letter, which has wide margins. The plain text letter may therefore get read. The HTML letter is more likely to get deleted. Simple. "If you can't read it, you delete it."
I write Gary North's Reality Check for business people and investors. I have always mandated that it be mailed out in plain text, just as I submit it. Why? (1) Because everyone can read plain text in his e-mail program; (2) Because the formatting stays the same. It arrives in the reader's inbox looking exactly as it was sent. I use 1.3-inch margins when I write the master. My plain-text letter looks exactly as I write it when it arrives in the subscriber's e-mail box.
My wide-margin formatting is rare in HTML-coded letters. Publishers use HTML because it allows bold face, underlines, and italics. Plain text is plain. It looks like typewriting. It looks old-fashioned. It looks un-hip. In short, it looks like me. I am a master of trailing-edge technology.
My website is mid-tech, but it's designed to be run by trailing-edge people. You are reading an HTML-coded document. But it is not a newsletter. It automatically fits your screen. You are not reading this as an e-letter with the Folders box activated.
Wide margins make e-mail newsletters easy to read on screen. Typed e-mail is composed and sent out with wide margins. Very few e-mail newsletters are sent with wide margins. Fact: 80% of email newsletters received are not read. HTML letters are tracked. The sender has software that shows if the reader clicks the letter to open it. Almost no one reads them. I suggest a reason: they can't read them in their e-mail programs because HTML letters more than fill the screen. So, the readers delete them without reading them.
So, formatting newsletters is crucial for e-letters. Not many e-letter publishers understand this.
Every day, I get several promotions in my email box. Almost none of them is formatted correctly.
I use Outlook Express as my email program. Most people do. It comes free with Internet Explorer. Business users probably use Outlook. Most other people (maybe 8%) use Thunderbird. But Thunderbird is in big trouble. Its only two paid developers have resigned.
Whether people use Outlook Express or a rival product, they can activate a Folders box. This is posted by default on the left side of the screen.
Folders are for filing and saving specific emails. If you want to save a letter or report, you create a new folder and move the document into the folder. So, the logical thing is to keep the Folders box on-screen at all times. Key fact: it absorbs about 25% of the screen. This reduces the on-screen space for reading any email.
This is a crucial fact of e-letter publishing, yet it is not understood by the vast majority of e-letter publishers. It is their job to understand their business, but they do not understand the digital side of their business.
E-letter formatting is digital. It is done by technicians. The publishers defer to salaried technicians. The technicians are not marketers.
The editors submit their copy. So do ad writers. An assistant formats this copy into HTML. These assistants are technicians who know how to format an HTML page. Editors and ad writers rarely know how to do this. They delegate this task without providing instructions about formatting. This is costing them money.
The layout people tend to forget that it is easier to read documents on-screen if the document has relatively short lines. That's why newspapers have columns. The eyes get lost on-screen if the person has to read long lines. Moving the eyes back to the left and down to the next line is much more difficult when lines are long.
In at least 80% of all cases, the assistants format the pages to fit their document composition program's computer screen layout (full), not their email program's screen. They probably have 21-inch screens. They do not consider the shrink-space effects of Folders on 14-inch laptop screens. They therefore set the margins too narrow (i.e., text too wide). So, their e-letters will not fit into an email program's viewing screen unless the recipient deliberately turns off the Folders box. Hardly any user will do this if he uses folders regularly.
They also set their screens in the 1024 x768 pixels mode. This is OK if you're young and if you have a large screen. For older guys -- who have money to spend -- who set their screens with the largest text size (800x600 pixels) so they can read it, the HTML pages do not fit in the e-mail screen. The layout people never think of this. They are young, with big screens.
The kiss of death is the automatic appearance at the bottom of the email program's screen of the dreaded left-right scroll bar. It appears whenever the document does not fit in the remaining space (75%) with Folders activated. No one will sit there, scrolling back and forth, line by line, to read a 2-page or 10-page ad. Instead, he will click the So, the HTML-formatted letter goes unread on a 14-inch screen, 800x600 pixels, with Folders activated. If it's an ad, it goes unread. An ad unread is a sales opportunity lost. Publishers, kiss your money goodbye. So, in summary: 1. Businessmen have money. Every publisher and ad writer should use Outlook Express with Folders activated. Also, he should read his documents on a 14-inch screen, 800x600 pixels. This way, he can see if the e-letters and ads are unreadable for anyone. Don't exclude anyone. Accept money from anyone. Activate Folders. If Folders is not activated (not visible), put the cursor on the word Inbox. Left-click it. The Folders list pops up. There is an icon of a thumb tack on the right upper side of the Folders box. Left-click it. Presto! The Folders box is permanent. He will soon have an education in e-mail marketing. The left-right scroll bar will take over. Watch money go down the formatting drain! I hereby offer two universal rules: Check both before pulling the trigger. Got that? Before. Mailed letters and ads are like sailed ships: gone.
I sent an early version of this report to Bob Bly, who is one of America's premier ad copywriters. He mails out a monthly e-letter . . . in plain text. He sent my report to his administrative assistant. Here was her reply, forwarded to me as well as Bob. However, I don't think this problem is isolated to Outlook Express users - I
have found that many webmail clients also experience frequently format
issues with HTML messages. For example, we use SquirrelMail for our remote
access email - it is a standards-based webmail package written in PHP but
most of the HTML mail that I receive or view through SquirrelMail have
serious format shortcomings - lots of extraneous characters and usually I
have to scroll down pages before I even can view the start of a message -
needless to say, I usually delete these as well. One of the perks of
sending HTML eletters is that the delivery and open rates can be tracked so
in many cases an ad may be incorrectly dismissed - marketers see that their
ad was delivered and opened but no click thru followed when perhaps the ad
would have soared if it presented clearly. I have limited knowledge of HTML and know almost nothing about formatting an
HTML message however I can't imagine why publishers don't demand the extra
steps from their HTML technicians/experts to assure their messages can be
viewed clearly. Perhaps you can't guarantee the every single viewer will
"see" your message perfectly but if an HTML webpage can be formatted so that
"most" can see it clearly - certainly eletters can and should be formatted
in this manner as well. Sorry for the long-winded response... Hope this helps. So, I offer two formulas: Take your pick. If you pick #2, take two steps: Or else lose a lot more money.
2. I write for businessmen.
3. Businessmen increasingly use laptop computers.
4. Laptop computers have 14-inch screens.
5. If the businessman has activated Folders, he has 75% of his screen.
6. I want my letters and my ads to fit in this space.
7. If they don't fit, the readers will delete them, unread.
8. My letters and ads in HTML must be formatted to fit.
9. Very few Internet publishers and ad copywriters understand this.1. All guns are loaded.
2. All HTML-formatted letters and ads are formatted with narrow margins.I completely agree with Gary, I think this is clear and detailed. It amazes
me how many HTML emails come in that completely run off screen - and I also
delete these messages pretty quickly. We also send out all of our eletters
in plain text, formatted to 65 characters per line in efforts to eliminate
these formatting issues.
1. Narrow-margin HTML + laptops = losses
2. Wide-margin HTML + laptops = profits1. Make sure your layout people understand what you want and why.
2. Read on a 14-inch screen, 800x600 pixels, with Folders activated whatever your IT department mails out, before it is mass mailed . . . every mailing, no exceptions (see universal rule #2).[Note to ad copywriters: In your contract, you must spell out the requirement for wide margins, and you must also mandate that your ad be mailed to you before it is mass mailed. Read the ad on a 14-inch screen, 800x600 pixels, with Folders activated.]
© 2022 GaryNorth.com, Inc., 2005-2021 All Rights Reserved. Reproduction without permission prohibited.