Width of your html emails and newsletters
If you have ever designed a html emails you would know one of the trickiest question is what is the width of the mail 
or the newsletter. I knew that the width of the email template should not be 100% because that looks aesthetic and not because of technical reasons. To go with this to the client is tough because you want to present the customer with information why a suggestion for a certain size is being made.
One of the reasons why the width of the email or the newsletter has to be different than a html page because the way the readers see them. Most of the emails are viewed in a email software where the email content is shown in a preview windows which is about 65% of the screen width if the window is maximized. If the screen resolution is 1024 x 768 then the viewable area is about 650 pixels in width. According to campaign monitor "around 75% of people who use preview panes go for the horizontal version, while the remaining 25% prefer the vertical version" which means that strong messaging should be there at the start of the mail so that they are compelled to read the full mail.
Christofer in one of the posts on the blog where he analyzes the approach to width of the email or a newsletter, believes that it is a mistake in case of you have 100% as that would not look good under most of the scenarios. After studying some of the good email newsletters and templates he concludes that for best results the width of the html emails and newsletter should be between 600 to 650 pixels. He also addresses the issue of alignment of emails or a newsletter and concludes that it is best to have it center aligned. He has a great article and it is a must read for anyone who is going to design a html newsletter or an html email and you can find it here http://emailuniverse.com/ezine-tips/?Ezine-Width—How-Wide-Should-An-HTML-Email-Newsletter-Be?&id=1305.
There is another post on campaign monitor blog about the best practices for html design of an email and newsletter in a bulleted list at http://www.campaignmonitor.com/blog/archives/2005/11/html_email_desi.html. Another list at http://www.b2bemailmarketing.com/2006/03/20_html_email_d.html also lists 20 to do’s for a good html email or an html newsletter.
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| An email might be viewed by two people even though both are using Outlook | |
Some of the useful links that are worth reading are
- http://www.tendenci.com/en/helpfiles/v/103
- http://blog.campaigner.com/newsletter_blog/2006/10/change_is_good.html - Many very easy to understand posts on best practices for html emails and newsletters.
- http://www.campaignmonitor.com/blog/archives/2005/11/html_email_desi.html
- http://emailuniverse.com/ezine-tips/?Ezine-Width—How-Wide-Should-An-HTML-Email-Newsletter-Be?&id=1305
- http://www.reachcustomersonline.com/content/2004/11/11/09.27.00/ - On this post, at the end of the post, links to some blogs, websites and other resources on online marketing are provided which are very useful.
- http://www.sitepoint.com/article/code-html-email-newsletters
- http://www.emaillabs.com/email_marketing_articles/article_2005_email_marketing_trends.html - Trends in email marketing for 2005 which are relevant today as well.
Once you have gone through these you would confident when you send an email or a newsletter. Best of luck!
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