Support Center/Build Your Fan Base - Promote Tab/Emailing Your Fans
Email: Creating and sending mass promotions
Bill Thompson
posted this on July 29, 2011 01:18 pm
Creating an Email
Creating an Email in Topspin requires a few simple steps:
- Select your recipients
- Compose your message
- Send your message
Select Your Recipients:
Smart Group
Smart Groups are helpful subgroups automatically created within your master mailing list. The most basic Smart Group is "All Fans". To send an email to your entire mailing list, just select “Smart Group” from the “Select Recipients” drop-down menu. In the menu that appears below, choose "All Fans". Finally, press “Add” below the selector. The Smart Group you’ve chosen will then be added to your “Send To” list. Smart Groups also allow you to include or exclude recipients based on data-driven criteria. For instance, you can send targeted emails to "All Purchasers of Product X", or perhaps exclude all fans residing in Djibouti.
Tag
Tags allow you to choose recipients based on tags you've created in the your Fans section. To add all fans that fall under a particular tag, choose “Tag” from the “Select Recipients” selector. In the menu that appears, choose an existing tag. Finally, press “Add”.
Manual Entry
In Manual Entry mode, you're free to type in email addresses by hand. Make sure to separate all individual email addresses by commas, or your entries will be invalid. Technically, manually typed addresses do not have to exist in your Fans section. You can type in any address you'd like, but remember, sending a marketing email to someone who hasn't opted into your mailing list is considered spamming, and is a violation of our Artist Terms of Use.
Excluding Fans
You can refine who you send your email to by excluding certain fans via the same options above. Let's say you wanted to send an email to all fans in the Los Angeles Metro Area, but want to exclude fans who have already bought something from you. You can achieve this by excluding fans acquired via the specific purchase buttons from a specific campaign. This way, fans who have already purchased the record don't need to hear you asking them to buy it... again.
Tips
How to Email All Purchasers of an Offer
Sometimes, it may be advisable to email every customer who's purchased a particular offer with shipping updates or other customer service related information. However, keep this in mind: it's possible that some customers who have purchased items from you have decided *NOT* to opt into your mailing list. Such customers will *not* be in your Fans database and thus will *not* be included in any of your selected smart groups. In order to actually send an email to every single purchaser of an offer, you'll need to perform a Tag + Email from your Fulfill tab.
Schedule Send
You can set a future date/time for when you want your email to be sent. Check the box next to 'Schedule Send' and enter the date and time you'd like.
Include Redemption Code
If you check the 'Include Redemption Code' box, a unique redmeption code will be included in the email sent for each fan.
For more information on Redemption Codes, go to Product Redemption.
Creating Your Message
Campaign Name
This is the name you will use to track this mailing in your Promote history. Be as descriptive as you need to be for it to make sense.
Subject
This is the subject that will appear in your fans’ email client as the subject of your message. Make sure to avoid historically spammy words.
Message
This is where you create your message. If you’re simply typing and don’t have an existing HTML mail template, use the default editor. You will be able to control fonts, basic formatting, colors, images, hyperlinks, tables, etc.
If you have an existing email template, use the “Source" option. You can simply paste your HTML code into this box and you will be ready to go.
NOTE
Mail servers and clients frequently strip <head> elements out and the presentation of your message may be affected. Always use inline CSS for styling.
NOTE
Make sure all your images can be accessed via the web. Any <img> tags should have a full path that you can paste in your browser to see the image file - e.g., http://www.google.com/intl/en_ALL/images/logo.gif
vs ../intl/en_ALL/images/logo.gif
NOTE
Flash media (contained in <object> or <embed> tags) behaves unpredictably in email clients. If you must use Flash in your email, don't make your primary message depend on it.
NOTE
Topspin Purchase buttons will not function in Emails created in the 'promote' tab.
Creating Your Message
Campaign Name
This is the name you will use to track this mailing in your Offer history. Be as descriptive as you need to be for it to make sense.
Subject
This is the subject that will appear in your fans’ mail client as the subject of your message.
Message
This is where you create your message. If you’re simply typing and don’t have an existing HTML mail template, use the default Rich Text Editor. You will be able to control fonts, basic formatting, colors, etc.
If you have an existing email template, use the “HTML Mode” option. You can simply paste your HTML code into this box and you will be ready to go.
NOTE
Be careful with relying heavily on <script> tags, external stylesheets, or anything that you would put in the <head> section of an HTML document. Mail servers and clients frequently strip these elements out and the presentation of your message may be affected.
NOTE
Make sure all your images can be accessed via the web. Any <img> tags should have a full path that you can paste in your browser to see the image file - e.g., http://www.google.com/intl/en_ALL/images/logo.gif vs ../intl/en_ALL/images/logo.gif
NOTE
Flash media - contained in <object> or <embed> tags - may behave unpredictably in email clients. If you are using Flash in your email, you should not make your primary message depend on it.
NOTE
Topspin Purchase buttons will not function in Emails created in the 'promote' tab.
Previewing Your Message
Before you send the final email message, click on the “Send a Preview Email” link. You will be presented with a text area to enter email addresses that you want to send to as a test. This is how you can be sure that your email will appear as expected, and proof for any mistakes. Add email addresses to the box, and separate them with commas (try sending to email addresses like Hotmail, GMail, etc to see how users of those services may see your email). Press “Send Preview” to see what you’ve got.
NOTE
Use Preview for making sure the email appears as you want and for proofreading. Emails sent through this will not be reflected or tracked in the campaign metrics. Test as many times as you need to get it just right.
Sending the Final Message
After you’ve completed your message, check the box next to 'I promise this email is not spam and all recipients have opted in to my email list'. Then click “Send”. If you have a large recipient list, it may take some time for the email to reach all the recipients - this is completely normal for high-volume mailings.
View Performance Data
Find your Email campaign under the “Summary” view of the “Promote” section. Click on the campaign name and you’ll be able to view data like number of emails sent, viewed, clicked, etc.
HTML Email Best Practices
- You must use absolute links (http://page.com/image/imagename.jpg), not relative links (.../images/imagename.jpg)
- CSS styles and stylesheets are not universally supported. All styles must be done in the div in the body of the html. e.g., <div style="font: 14px Geneva; color:#00CC99; "align="left"><br>
- Yahoo (and other) browser-based emails do not support any background colors in HTML. So always make sure your email looks good with a white background.
- Many many email clients do not support flash and JS. Make sure you're redirecting to a static HTML page.
- Most email clients do not automatically show images until you allow them. Make sure you also include a prominent, text-based call to action in your email design, as some fans may never choose to view your images.
- Absolute positioning of divs is not consistent in email clients. Use relative positions for best results.
- To avoid triggering Spam alerts when sending emails to your fans, try following these basic guidelines published by our email services provider SendGrid: How To Avoid the Spam Folder
