ML1
Sending HTML email internally/in-house
Hi all,
I'm looking to find the best way of sending HTML email in-house. We currently create emails in Dreamweaver and import/send through a normal Outlook email to the rest of the office. All our offices use Outlook/Blackberry/Good Technologies.
Can anyone recommend a solution for sending HTML email in-house? Would need to send clean code and connect directly to exchange. Extra features like A/B testing and analytics would be a bonus.
Any suggestions you might have would be great. Even if there's an Outlook add-on that does the job.
Thanks,
Mike
Hi Michael,
I'm a bit late to the party but you might like to check out the company I work for: Newsweaver [www.newsweaver.com]
Our Internal Connect product is designed specifically for internal communications and all of the common problems faced when using email marketing software for internal email (including the ones you've mentioned).
A couple of thoughts...
You could just use an ESP for this and treat it like any other newsletter. You'll get all your split testing options and analytics.
Mailchimp have a great free option with up to 2000 subscribers if you're on a budget.
In exchange you could set up an all.staff@company.com email address that would be forwarded to everyone in the company then install Thundirbird to send it or use an online service like putsmail, although I don't think you'll get replies if you do it via putsmail.
Agreed. Mailchimp would be the better option here if you don't already have an ESP available for use.
The other option of sending to a single address via Outlook/Thunderbird etc wouldn't leave you any room for tracking. Though you can request a read/delivery receipt in Outlook but the receiving party doesn't have to accept these receipts when opening the mail - So you may never have a true read count.
Thanks both. We did use Mailchimp for a time. The issue with an externally hosted ESP is you have to have an unsubscribe link - even if you're sending within your own company. Tried to play around with that a little and rightly fell foul of their terms and conditions.
Is there a standalone bit of software that can connect to exchange that will do the job? Something like e-Campaign but better I suppose. Ideally a web based solution but without the unsubscribe requirement and direct exchange connection.
Hi Michael,
Just done a quick Google search to see if anyone provides this sort of product and I came across these... http://bananatag.com/ and https://contactmonkey.com which seem pretty good and rather cheap also, so it may be worth checking out?
Otherwise you can use the minimal tracking features already built into Outlook, more information can be found here:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/outlook-help/add-tracking-to-email-messages-HA010355569.aspx