It is interesting that you hit on a few of the same points though and even got into a little more of the technical aspects.

Although in the end I think the biggest mistake in email marketing is where you get your list from. Building a targeted and credible list can work wonders!

As a copywriter, I know how important it is to carefully use bold and underlining to make scanning even easier.

Finally – other conversion factor: building a good relationship. The biggest factor in whether your recipient opens the email is whether they got some good info out of the last one you sent. Make sure it’s worth their while to even read the email, let alone click through.

Also interesting is that you suggest placing/justifying the primary image to the left. We’ve long been practicing a right-justified image so that, in the preview screen (whether the recipient previews horizontally or vertically), the recipient always sees the text rather than just the image.

Brian, any thoughts on using creative in an EM campaign vs. clear and to the point? I’d like to be able to share your insights with our creative director, who does tend to favour clever over clear. Love to hear from you about this.

“Add a subscription date to your message, such as: “Thank you for signing up on 07/13/06.” This builds email credibility. The more information about the subscription you put in your email, the easier it is for ISPs to determine that the mailing was a legitimate, subscribed mailing.”

Bryan, the statement above attributed to Yasifur/Kobemail implies that spam technology/filters understand semantics. Is that what you and Yasifur are saying? It implies that ISPs and Spam technology providers are reading user emails based on meaning…
While providing such info clearly improves credibility with the recipient, how does the ISP/Spam Filter actually know that the recipient did subscribe?