Who doesn't plant himself never grows!
For those of you who have already done videoconferences with me, you know that my office is a mini jungle. My pilea de compet' in the background is only the iceberg that hides the forest (what do you mean, that's not the expression?!). For the others, you should know that I am able to spend my entire Sunday scouring all the local nurseries to find a Black Lace Eva elderberry!
Although it is a passion that shows its nose during my calls, I do it in my spare time. So, when I received the email below signed by Truffaut Pro a few days ago, I was, if you'll pardon the expression, up to my eyeballs (umm I don't have an office chair, but a ball, for the back all that). My love for plants immediately did a little happy dance, and my legendary professionalism grumbled very very loudly. And if I had to list my passions, bitching is also on the top list!
Focus on the Sender / Object / Preheader trinomial
Sender's name : TRUFFAUT by Cartégie
Sender's address: truffaut@part.offres-cartegie.fr
Reply address: marketing@idaia.group
Subject: Discover TRUFFAUT PRO
Preheader : Customized quotation, delivery, advice...
This email is sent on behalf of Truffaut Pro by Cartégie, a company specialized in data. For your information, I am not the only one at Badsender to have received the campaign: there are six of us + our yesreply address, so we all got it. Legally, we are in B2B, you know the drill.
Let's talk quickly about the sender's name. Personally, I don't see the point of putting Cartégie in front. It doesn't bring anything to the understanding of the message, and it would even tend to lose the reader. That said, it's not there by chance (as Jon reminded me), it's a reco from Signal Spam and Orange in order to identify the owner of the data, otherwise the email would arrive as spam at Orange.
The sender's address is not particularly trustworthy either. Truffaut is mentioned, but not in the domain name. For the most suspicious people (okay, I'm talking about me)A small alarm is immediately activated.
I am clearly reluctant to send emails with a domain name that does not correspond to the company that is supposed to be speaking in the campaign, and I will be happy to discuss this with you. From my point of view, which is admittedly particularly biased due to my job, it is imperative to reassure prospectsThis is even more true when they come from a rented list that will receive an unsolicited email.
I can already hear the arguments about technical constraints, that setting up a sending address takes time, that it takes 48 hours for the propagation on the domain name to be effective, blah blah blah. But I think we all agree that with a little organization it's not that complicated, you just have to do this step at the beginning of the project. So, we might as well do it well the best way possible. And if you have any questions about this, our Seb Fischer will help you.
Concerning the reply address, we discover a new protagonist who does not appear anywhere else in the email. Spolier alert: the Idaia Group belongs to Cartégie. This is not a big surprise. But still, it adds a bit of incomprehension to the mess.
Let's move on to the object and its sidekick the preheader. We say it, we repeat it: the subject line must allow the reader to understand the main subject of the email content. You're going to tell me that it's OK in this case, well yes but no. The verb "to discover", again and again! It has a good back. The poor thing is worthless in emailing these days, it is used in all sorts of ways: discover the benefits, discover your promo, discover our latest articles... Am I the only one who overdoses on it? Here, we don't really learn anything about the object. Please, friends marketers, be original.
And the preheader? What can I say... let's review our classics: it must be complementary to the object to encourage the opening. We'll pass. At a discovery stage, why talk to us about quotes or delivery, without even knowing the content of the email? So yes, we can assume that the vast majority of contacts know the brand, and already have an idea of the theme. But this is the Pro version with specific services.
Why not:
Subject: Having a good potho... even at the office!
Preheader: How about greening your workspace?
Subject: Greening your office with the help of our experts
Preheader: Because plants improve well-being at work
Subject: Do you want plants for your office?
Preheader : We accompany you in the interior and exterior design
Let's talk design and code
If the subject line and the preheader don't tell us much, we might as well tell you that without the images, the email is... stale. NO text is in HTMLAnd don't be offended to tell me that there is the mirror link and the legal notice. Even the Alt's don't make up for it, they repeat themselves and have no graphic layout.
At this point, my love for plants can't help the construction of this campaign. There is no great complexity in the structure, why integrate everything in images? For ease I guess, it's faster, 2-3 cuts, a few links and basta. But in terms of accessibility, can we still afford to send this kind of email today? Rhetorical question, as you can imagine.
Speaking of accessibility, it lacks essential prerequisites in the email such as 120DPI processing, attributes role="presentation"or the attribute lang in the HTML tag. On the other hand, there are attributes Title or ID on links and images, which are not recommended. Thomas has also detailed all you need to know about accessibility in emailing in an article, feel free to read it 😉
To finish on the code, the spaces between elements are managed with empty cells, which could be done with padding to lighten the HTML. Some Div and Table could be removed, and the present spongy code is useless in case of full image. No surprise on the media queries side, there is none, so no responsive version.
As long as we were doing a full image, we could have had something more visual, which would have been a snap, a plant wall, a waterfall of ferns, an abundant rooftop (sorry, I get carried away). Well, you will have understood that I am a bit (do you have it?) disappointed.
Are we dealing with a "badsender"?
Well, for me, yes. Be careful, I'm not saying that it is a spam, but a bad sending, and this for several reasons.
Send a B2B campaign to a rented database, after all they are within their rights, but please: target a minimum. Here, let's remember that everyone at Badsender received the email. The theme is probably not the most relevant for everyone. I might as well admit it: I'm the only one who read the email. The promotion of a beer machine would have been more interesting for my colleagues for example ^^.
The email itself needs a good little redesign, both in design and in HTML. The full image in 2022, it's no! No responsive version, that's a no! Control your communications, even those routed by your partners. And to help you do it, what better than a Design System ? 😉
On that note, since plants improve well-being, to help them, I'm going back to pamper my Pilea family, kisses.
