| So, why would you want to send your campaigns | | | | them emails in the future, hence risk being |
| out using an email service provider(ESP) | | | | reported by the recipient as being a |
| rather than your standard email program | | | | SPAMMER..all simply because you put the onus |
| (SEP)? Here are some points to | | | | on the recipient.6. An ESP allows you to view |
| consider......1. An ESP allows you to send | | | | the statistics of your campaign, such as open |
| the message using MIME technology, which | | | | rate and click through rate for individual |
| means it sends an HTML (with pictures and | | | | links, thereby allowing you to continually |
| colour) version to those who can receive HTML | | | | develop your relationship with your |
| and a text version to those who can't. An SEP | | | | subscriber by utilising these statistics for |
| does not recognise whether the recipient can | | | | market research. Using an SEP, you have no |
| read HTML emails or not when sending emails. | | | | knowledge of who opens their emails and which |
| Therefore if you send an HTML email to all | | | | links/products/services/articles are of |
| your recipients, those who cannot receive | | | | interest to them.7. With an ESP, you can |
| HTML emails receive what looks to them like | | | | programme when the campaign is to be sent out |
| gobbledygook - which reflects badly upon your | | | | - unlike sending it from your PC and using |
| Company and results in many | | | | your ISP. ISP's have limitations on how many |
| unsubscribes.2. An ESP cannot send viruses as | | | | emails can be sent (generally 100), hence if |
| they are designed to only send emails, not | | | | you have a large database, they would need to |
| receive them, hence they are virus free. | | | | be sent in batches, often days apart.8. An |
| Using an SEP, you may unknowingly send a | | | | ESP will enable you to upload your images |
| virus to your recipients, as your computer | | | | easily to their system, therefore eliminating |
| can receive emails and viruses.3. Using an | | | | the need to FTP knowledge or a website server |
| ESP, you can personalise your emails, thereby | | | | of your own. Most SEP's embed the images |
| not only helping with to build the client | | | | within the email, rather than referring to |
| customer relationship, but also enabling the | | | | them on a server, which makes the emails time |
| success rate to be higher as the email will | | | | consuming to send & slow for recipient to |
| be more Spam filter friendly.4. Each email is | | | | open.9. By sending attachments you are |
| individually sent rather than the typical | | | | restricting the amount of recipients who will |
| bulk send by SEP's. The Privacy law now | | | | receive the email and/or open the attachment. |
| required all bulk emails to use the BCC field | | | | Many corporations do not allow the recipient |
| (rather than the CC field), which in turn | | | | to open attachments due to the risk of |
| restricts your recipients to receiving the | | | | viruses. In addition to this, Internet |
| email, as many government and other | | | | Explorer 6, Service Pack 1 has been released |
| corporations have set their SPAM filters to | | | | and Outlook Express users will find they |
| reject all BCC emails.5. An ESP uses | | | | can't open attachments after installing the |
| sophisticated software to automate the | | | | new software as Microsoft has blocked the |
| unsubscribe/subscribe process. When using a | | | | opening of attachments.10. Using an ESP to |
| simple "click here to unsubscribe" link, you | | | | send your email campaigns can prove to be |
| are putting the onus on the recipient to | | | | cheaper in the long run once you have tallied |
| unsubscribe successfully. If you are using | | | | up all the negatives of using an SEP.Kath Pay |
| BCC, the recipient is unable to know which | | | | is Marketing Director of Ezemail, a web-based |
| email address they need to use to manually | | | | e-communications tool, which enables you to |
| unsubscribe. If they unsubscribe using the | | | | create, send and track your email marketing |
| wrong email address, you will then still send | | | | and SMS messaging campaigns. |