EMAIL MARKETING FAQS

Email Marketing FAQs

Campaigns

How do I choose a template?

There are two ways to choose a template for your newsletter:

Use the ETS Library, where you will find dozens of pre-made templates to use. You will be automatically prompted to choose a template during the campaign creation process.
Get a customized template built just for you by one of the designers in our Creative Marketplace.

How do I edit a template?

To create a new campaign:

From your dashboard, click "Create a new campaign"
Complete step 1 by entering all pertinent information (Email, Subject Line, etc.)
Click next, and you will be prompted to choose the campaign creative. Click on the template should would like and hit next
You are now brought to a page where you can edit the template.

To edit an existing campaign:

Under your dashboard you should see a list of all campaigns. Click on the draft you are working on and edit as needed.

How do I preview the edited template?

To preview a template, go to step 4 of "Create a new campaign" or go to the Email Marketing tab, click on Campaigns, and click on the magnifying glass next to the campaign name.

What are the requirements for importing my own HTML?

When importing your own HTML for a campaign, you must upload all content into 1 zip file. The requirements for this zip file are:

All files must be zipped into 1 file or the parent folder containing all the files is zipped
Within the zip file:
- There must be 1 .html, .htm, or .xhtml file
- The title of this file must be "template" aka template.html
- All images must be included in a folder called "images" (i.e. in the HTML, the image pathway should be < img src="images/imagename.jpg">
- No file or image names should have spaces in them
- Thumbnail images (if you have one) needs to be in root (same directory as .html file ) named "thumb" i.e. thumb.jpg

How do I upload an image and/or logo?

To upload an image or logo, go to the My Files tab under Email Marketing. To upload an image directly into a template you are working on, click on the image button in the campaign editor.

Can I create a test message?

Yes, you will automatically be prompted to test your email after previewing it.

How do I save an email as a draft?

You can save a campaign as a draft at any time by clicking the "Save" button at the bottom of the page.

How do I insert a "forward to a friend link"?

A "forward to a friend" link will automatically appear when you preview your email.

What is the View in Browser link and can I remove it?

The "View in Browser" link appears at the top of every outgoing email we send. This allows your subscribers to view the email in a browser if your email client has images disabled. This is something that cannot be removed from the outgoing email.

Why do I receive 2 different emails when I send a test to myself?

When you send a test email out of Easy To Send, we send both the HTML and the plain text version so that you can see how both emails will look when your subscribers receive them. Rest assured, we do not send 2 emails to each of your recipients.

What are Merge Tags and why would I use them in my email?

Merge tags allow you to customize and personalize your email content with tags such as first name, last name, and email address. So, instead of starting your email campaign off with Dear Friend, you can now write Dear @@FIRSTNAME@@ and this will pull in the First Name field from the list you are sending to. Currently, the only options are first name, last name, and email address.

Do I have the ability to add my Facebook or Twitter info inside my email campaigns?

Yes. When you are creating your email marketing campaign, the toolbar includes the images and links for both Facebook and Twitter. After you insert this information, you will need to include the links to your unique pages.

Will my company name and address automatically show up in the footer of the email or do I have to add that in the content?

The company name and address will automatically be placed in the footer of your outgoing emails. We collect this information when you sign up for an Easy To Send account. If you need to update this information, please do so in the Account Settings.

List

How do I upload my contacts?

To import your contacts into your Easy to Send list, go to the "List" tab in your dashboard and click on the button "Create a new list" – you will then have the option to import the list.

How do I transfer my contacts from another email service?

To transfer contacts from another email service merely export the contact list as a .csv or excel file, and import the file on to Easy To Send.

Can I mail to a rented or purchased list?

Easy To Send strictly prohibits sending emails to rented or purchased list. The reason being that the email addresses on these lists did not give your company permission to send to them. Also, depending upon where this list came from, it could hurt your reputation and possibly land you on a major blacklist. Any member found to be purchasing or renting a list will lose membership to Easy To Send.

Why can't I delete my list?

Lists can not be deleted if it is set for any scheduled campaign or if the list was sent to within the past month. Because plan prices are based on the highest unique subscriber count, we put measures in place to properly calculate this number, including preventing users from continuously deleting and adding lists.

Reporting

When should I check the report for the first time?

You should wait at least 24 hours before viewing your campaign report to give your subscribers sufficient time to act. Keep in mind that waiting or checking back in 72 hours will allow for a more complete report as it allows subscribers multiple days to act as well as gives us time to retry soft bounces.

How do you know when someone opens my email campaign?

When a campaign is sent through Easy To Send, we embed an invisible graphic at the bottom of your HTML email. This open tracking pixel is unique to each campaign that is sent. Every time someone opens your email, that open tracking pixel is downloaded from our server and records an open.

How do I know who reported my email campaign as spam?

Inside the Easy To Send reporting module, there is a tab for Complaints aka emails that were marked as spam. Here you can see how many recipients reported your email as spam. Most of the major ISPs have the ability to send us complaints from users that mark an email as spam.

How often are Easy To Send's reports refreshed?

Most reporting is updated immediately with activity from your subscribers. Opens, clicks, complaints, unsubscribes, and hard bounces are all updated as these activities occur. Soft bounce reporting can take up to 48 hours depending on the ISP and the number of retries. We recommend waiting 24 hours before viewing your report so that you can have a better understanding of how your recipients interacted with your email marketing campaign.

Deliverability

Are bounced emails removed from my list automatically?

Hard bounces will be removed automatically. Soft bounces will be retried once every 24 hours for 4 days. After 3 campaigns (a total of 9 retries), if an email is still undeliverable, it is then considered a hard bounce and added to the suppression list.

What is the difference between a hard bounce and a soft bounce?

Hard: The rejection reason from the recipient mail server indicates a permanent delivery failure. Retried delivery attempts will not be successful. An example of a hard bounce would be a bad mailbox.

Soft: The rejection reason from the recipient mail server indicates a transient delivery failure. Retried delivery attempts may be successful. An example of a soft bounce would be mailbox full.

Can having too many hard or soft bounces hurt my deliverability?

The short answer is yes. Too many hard bounces in your list could indicate an old list and too many soft bounces could indicate that you are being rate limited at an ISP due to complaints or traffic. ISPs monitor and track those senders that send to large amounts of bad mailboxes, as well as those who get soft bounced due to complaints. This could also affect your reputation on the IP and the domain that you are sending from.

Why are my emails going into my customer's bulk folder?

This is the million dollar question! There are many reasons why your emails could be going to your customer's bulk folder. Here are a few questions to ask yourself:

Did you send to a new list that you haven't sent to before?
Did you receive a lot of abuse complaints?
Did you send to many spam traps?
Has the reputation on the IP address gone down?
ISPs can and will change their filters thousands of times a day
A word/phrase that was accepted 2 hours ago, may be blocked now
Test your content before sending to your live lists

What are email headers and how do I find them?

Email headers include important information about the email such as from name, from address, mail server information, authentication details, and much more. Email headers can be key to discovering where the email came from. Depending upon the ISP or inbox provider, headers can be located in many different places. Most of the time, you can find the headers by right clicking on the email or by selecting it under the options area.

How do I lower my abuse complaints?

This is a question that comes up quite often. There are many ways to lower your abuse complaints, but mostly it boils down to your list and content. Make sure that you are sending to your most recent and engaged active openers. Also, make sure that your content is relevant and something that your subscribers will want to open. One recommendation is to add an additional unsubscribe link to the top of your mailing content.

What does the term whitelisting mean and does it guarantee inbox placement?

Whitelisting is a term defined by the list of IP addresses or domains that are specifically allowed entry into a particular network. Some ISPs offer a bulk sender whitelist that allow higher volume of emails to be delivered into their network. Please note that being on an ISP whitelist does not guarantee email in boxing.

Should I be concerned about landing on a blacklist? Which blacklist is the worst?

You should always be concerned about landing on a blacklist. The repercussions of landing on a blacklist could mean that your emails do not get delivered into those domains/ISPs that monitor that blacklist. Getting listed on a major blacklist, such as Spamhaus, could cause a very high bounce rate at most of the major ISPs. There are quite a few minor blacklists, such as FiveTen, that will not affect your deliverability. Depending upon the nature of the offense, Easy To Send may be able to assist in getting you off of the blacklist, but the only way to guarantee not being on a blacklist to prevent getting blacklisted in the first place.

If I choose another from address to send my emails, will my deliverability improve?

It may, but probably not. If many of your subscribers have whitelisted your from address then you will get whitelisitng privileges such as images being enabled by default. If you change your from address then you could experience worse deliverability.

Will it hurt my deliverability if I rent a list and send to it?

The short and long answer on this is yes. List rental and list purchasing is not recommended, and is prohibited in the Easy To Send Terms of Use Agreement. The reason for this is that the email addresses on these lists did not give your company permission to send to them. Also, depending upon where this list came from, it could hurt your reputation and possibly land you on a major blacklist. Any member found to be purchasing or renting a list will lose membership to Easy To Send.