In this post I am going to outline the steps involved in the creation of a superior custom e-blast. There are tools out there that allow you to select templates; however, we do not use nor recommend this at Pristine.

1. Design – The first step is the design process. This is where the graphic designer creates the visual layout using tools like photoshop or illustrator. The graphic designer works with the content writer to come up with the visual concept.

2. Creation – Once the layout is finalized and approved, a programmer uses the visual concept to create an html file.

3. Testing – A very important aspect of creating an e-blast is the html/CSS rendering in different email clients. Programmers tend to overlook this aspect. A superior e-blast will render perfectly in Outlook, Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo. Only the best programmers know the html/css quirks of each email client and can produce an e-blast that looks flawless in all.  Spam filtering is another overlooked issue during the testing phase. Certain words in your content, the ratio of content to html, the “from address” are a few items that can trigger your e-blast to go to spam.

4. Distribution – There are a number of different tools out there to distribute e-blasts. Constant Contact and Campaign Monitor are very popular. At Pristine we use Campaign Monitor.

5. Tracking – The last step is tracking. It is important to know how many of your e-blasts were opened, which links were clicked, how many went to junk. Campaign Monitor provides all this information in a nice visual graphical format.