Using all-HTML E-mail? Your Q4 Will Be a Nightmare: Exec

Retailers who are still using all HTML e-mail—and there are apparently a lot of them—are in for a horrendous online holiday shopping season, according to Michael Della Penna, chief marketing officer for Epsilon Interactive.

The prediction comes on the heels of a study conducted by Epsilon in which the e-mail service provider determined that 65% of e-mail users have encountered image suppression, where e-mail arrives in their inboxes without graphics displayed.

“If you’re a retailer and you’re doing all-image e-mail, you’re in for a rude awakening in Q4,” Della Penna said. “All those valuable promotional efforts you’re putting together are not going to be seen by key prospects and customers.”

E-mail box providers are increasingly blocking HTML in their efforts to fight the transmission of viruses through e-mail: AOL, Yahoo, Google and Microsoft among them.

There is some good news: 69% of e-mail users who have encountered image suppression said they at least sometimes activate images in statements or order forms from senders from whom they’ve bought, Epsilon’s survey determined. Also, 57% said they at least sometimes activate images in promotional e-mail from senders from whom they have bought, according to Epsilon.

But that still leaves a huge segment of e-mail recipients who aren’t seeing marketers’ graphics.

At the same time, many retailers simply take their print direct marketing pieces and repurpose them for e-mail because they think they’re saving time and money in production costs by using creative that has already proven to work.

Also, ad agencies will often repurpose print creative for e-mail because producing new creative for e-mail requires getting all the appropriate people at the client company to sign off on it. It’s simply easier to use creative that has already been given the OK by everyone who matters on the client side.

“You don’t want to take that shortcut this year,” said Della Penna. “You really have to rethink the way you rebuild creative.”

Those who don’t may see their offline sales negatively affected, as well, he said. In an Epsilon study in January, 65% of those surveyed said they will buy in a store after receiving a promotional e-mail. But if they don’t see the offer, they can’t respond to it on or offline.

Della Penna said e-mail should include a mix of images and text, all above the fold, that ensure the recipient sees the marketer’s offer whether or not the images are blocked. He also recommended that marketers educate recipients on default image suppression and how to turn images on.

Otherwise, he said: “You’re going to get slaughtered online this year.”