Testing of our email bulletins and newsletters - not many people do it, but all of us should make this an important part of our marketing campaign checklist. Most marketers will be familiar with testing an offer on a small segment of a customer database to gauge response, therefore predicting the potential success of a campaign.

This article will deal with testing before a campaign gets to this stage. Why? Many companies send email newsletters or bulletin updates that don’t require a direct response; this can sometimes lead to the thought process that, once built, an email is ready to send. This can start a dangerous habit for the unsuspecting email marketer. A badly constructed or non-tested email can lead to poor brand representation, unreadable text, incorrect links or graphics and in some cases, loss of revenue.

Followed are some points from a checklist that I use extensively to make sure email campaigns are correct before the send button is clicked.

Spell Check and Proof Reading

This may seem obvious but it is amazing how many newsletters I receive with spelling errors and inconsistencies. Putting your document through a spell check is sometimes not enough. For example: spell check will not bring badly wrote grammar too you’re attention. It wilt only pack up spilling mistakes, not incorrect wording and will sometimes pass over Australian, English and American variations of words. Proof read your documents, or, better-yet, get someone else to proof read them, making sure they look out for:

Spelling mistakes;

Incorrect use of grammar;

Coherent writing style; Punctuation mistakes;

Lettering consistency (e.g. make sure I is not i);

Correct use of homophones (their, there and they’re).

Note: iSmart Bulletin and iSmart Announce provide a ‘send test’ function that allows you to send your bulletin or newsletter to co-workers for proofing. You can also click the print icon to keep or distribute a hard copy.

Test Hyperlinks

Test all hyperlinks to make certain they are pointing to the correct page or email address. Incorrect links can be detrimental to a campaign, particularly if you have a call to action that results in an online purchase or email inquiry. If the wrong page is displayed, a customer may have to click through a multitude of pages to get to where they want to go, or worse, give up and move on to your competitor’s site. Likewise, if a customer has to search for your email address, it might be easier for them to go somewhere else.

Note: The preview tab within iSmart Bulletin allows you to see your email ‘live’. Links can be tested when looking at your email in this mode.

Brand Image

Make sure your company's brand image is consistent. This can encompass things like - imagery, text style, colors etc.

Note: iSmart Bulletin provides a style guide facility to ensure that your headings, subheadings, footers and text etc are always consistent.

Send to different email applications

There is a multitude of email applications available on the market and many of them display the html code differently in an email. Test your emails in different applications to make sure that customers receive the same email that left your desktop. If you know most of your clients use Outlook™, make sure your emails can be read by this application. Likewise, if a large proportion of your client base use Hotmail™, Yahoo™ or another web-based email application, open one of these accounts to use for testing. Check company details Make sure your subject line, from and reply to fields have been modified. It’s no use sending out a great looking email with ‘Test Bulletin’ in the subject line.

The last word

This guide should give you a good starting point to create your own company/industry specific pre-campaign checklist to ensure your emails are always professional, readable and in line with your company's brand identity.

For further information about iSmart products, please email peter@ismartsoftware.com

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