Last thought for this week….

…Having had a series of meetings today and devouring numerous biscuits of all shapes and sizes. I was just wondering if there was a survey as to the most popular meeting biscuits, what assortment would win?

I think Bourbon.

Congratulations to our latest recruit Ruth on her phenominal achievement.

Ruth recently completed the London Marathon, all 26.3 miles in 4Hrs 22minutes. Coming from someone who failed at their first atempt to run such a distance, believe me this is a great achievement.

If this was not enough, Ruth also was snapped by a photographer and found here picture spread over the front cover of the Monday’s Daily Mail.

Had I known I would have doubled her sponsorship money and painted a bda logo on her forhead.

Any PR is good PR and all that.

When we are given a blank canvass to design HTML emails we take into consideration the following:

Preview Pane
We optimise the HTML template design for the top 2-4 inches as there is only this much space to tell the story and persuade the viewers to open our email instead of just previewing it.
75% of users use a vertical preview pane, 25% use a horizontal preview pane. To accommodate both sets of users we design the HTML email template messages so that it displays the most important call to actions and key content in the top left of the message.

Images
We do not use more than 30% ratio of images to text as most ISP and spam filter emails with will block emails with a higher ratio of images.
Up to 45% of viewers may have images turned off or blocked in their email client so we design the layout to focus the readers eyes on the key content of the message and also include image tags with full descriptions to encourage readers to download the images.

Width
We keep our HTML email width under 600 pixels to avoid users having to scroll to read the message.

Fonts
We use only universally supported fonts as non-standard fonts not supported by the reader’s computer may seriously affect the design layout.

Content
There are two distinct audiences, skimmers and readers. Readers are not a problem but skimmers will look at the top of the message, headlines and subheads and key bold phases throughout the message. We design the message, making proper use of bold face type style, so we can pull the reader down through the message and still deliver relevant content quickly.
Where possible we design the email to cover the main bullet points and use links to drive the viewer to your website. We encourage clients to include as many links as possible. Emails with many links will get a higher click rate than those with less links.
We include a text version of the email within the HTML so that it can be read by non-HTML email packages.

Scripts
We do not use scripts such as JavaScript as some applications view it as a security risk and will block messages. Instead we drive readers to a webpage where dynamic components are easily rendered.

HTML Code
We make sure our HTML code always conforms to W3C Standards. HTML code not conforming to WC3 can cause delivery and rendering issues.

bda speak out at an “Understanding Digital Conference” held by Williams Lea the print management giants.

As a result of some of bda’s ground breaking case studies we were asked by the Print Sourcing Director of Williams Lea to present our opinions and experiences in all aspects of digital technology.

The focus of our presentation was the utilisation of digital print to deliver one-to-one DM campaigns, and print-on-demand solutions (hence ‘now, now, now, now, now!’).

All clients want to add value, improve ROI, provide better response rates, better utilise their data and reduce wastage, but many don’t know how; we were there to illustrate how this is being delivering today!

We presented examples of; one-to-one direct mail where response rates hit 37%; an asset portal allowing personalised marketing collateral to be created online; and e-collateral, our print on demand solution delivering targeted, bespoke brochures minimising waste, eradicating bulk print and storage.

The 65 strong audience of account managers and directors posed questions on; the financial model; the effect of increased unit costs and how we are providing real ROI; deployment timescales and pitfalls in delivering such solutions; as well as where we see the print industry in the future.

To accompany our presentation we produced a personalised digital guide, swatch book and PURL allowing all delegates to download their own copy of the presentation and access additional information… So we got and idea of exactly how interested the audience was!

bda, always Strategic, Creative and Measured.

The end of another busy week for us here & we’re all about to head down to the pub to celebrate the start of what’s looking to a lovely sunny weekend. For those of you interested in the web & javascript trickery enjoy the link below.

http://www.netzgesta.de/glossy/

As you can tell with the rush of excitement this has been on hold to be posted for a few days. Then again they do say the best things come to those who wait…