The little things

Attention to detail is what defines the gulf between good and great.

A good email is one which gets consistently high delivery rates, a great one is which recipients read as a priority and respond immediately to any calls to action, whilst busily telling their friends and colleagues about it.

An email is like a house - a good strong framework, built on solid foundations, will enable it to provide shelter; innovative, attractive and well presented design and furnishing make it desireable to live in. Similarly with email, you need the skills of a builder, architect and designer to produce the ultimate email communications. Each will bring specialist knowledge which the project manager will meld together to ensure the finished product is something people eagerly anticipate and respond to readily.

The pursuit of excellence is about recognising that marginal increments count. Each small change or improvement will bring another marginal percentage of readers into the fold. Your goals must always be 100% delivery, 100% readership, 100% response and 100% retention - any the planning, design, writing and production need to aim at that goal. Each tiny detail can ove you closer to that goal. Acceptance of anything less will lead to lower delivery, readership, response and retention than you want.

Post send out audits are your greatest intelligence - so use them. Try and understand reader behaviour in the context of your email, and implement solutions to improve next time. It's the little things that can make the big differences.