Update your 'view online' texts now
Posted by Dominic Yeadon 23 Mar 2009
This week's Masterclass is all about how the small print at the very top of 50% of e-newsletters out there creates a negative impression straight away. Read on to see how you can prevent this common mistake from ever appearing in your e-newsletter. Check to see if you need to update yours.
 First, let's remember why we send out e-newsletters. To create a good impression, to keep in touch with our customers, to remind them why we still occupy a special place in their lives, to amuse, inform, educate and ultimately of course to sell to them. We also love sending our customers our e-newsletters because it is quick, cost-effective, friction-free and straightforward (with the right team and technologies).
So why do so many e-newsletters make the same mistake in the small print at the top?
You probably have some belters like these in your in-box right now:
* Does this e-mail look wrong to you?
* Are the images broken in this message?
* If you can't see this message properly...
These are all bad examples of the 'view online' small print. Reading these doesn't inspire confidence in the sender if even the sender thinks it might be 'wrong' or 'broken'.
Safe text for you to use:
 I recommend the simple and neutral: 'View this e-mail online, click here' (see the top of this Masterclass issue):
Q. Why have a 'view online' link at the top anyway Dom?
A. Browsers are more stable than e-mail clients which (less now than in previous years) can sometimes wreck a carefully-constructed HTML e-newsletter design, so you provide a quick way to click out of the (mangled) e-mail onto the proper version. Not many readers need to click now as e-mail software (with the notable exception of Microsoft) is better, and more people are using web-mail like Google Mail, so it's online anyway.
It usually sits above the HTML in a tiny font and, for now, yes it is worth having one.
 Worth checking: The gifted Arabella Weir built her famous catchphrase 'does my bum look big in this?' in the Fast Show and everybody laughed at her insecure cosmetics saleswoman character. Have a look at your own e-newsletter's 'view online' small print to check that you say nothing negative. Every little helps... Dom (and before you ask - no that's not a photo of me, it's Arabella).
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