Several months ago, before the redesign of Gmail was even announced, Google made even bigger waves in the email world. At their second annual AMP conference it was announced they were bringing AMP to email. What is AMP and do we even want it for email?

WHAT IS AMP⚡?

You may know of AMP, Accelerated Mobile Pages, the open-source web project started by Google. The noble and needed goal of the project was to make mobile web browsing faster and easier. While more and more people are browsing the web on mobile devices exclusively webpages are ever increasing in size and complexity. This has created a conundrum where mobile devices—traditionally strapped for bandwidth and download speeds—are increasing their market share of the web but receiving worse experiences.

AMP did just what it aimed to do and more. It’s served via normal web architecture and if a site doesn’t include the special AMP code then the good ole HTML, CSS, and JavaScript version of the site is loaded. If the AMP code is present and the end user is detected to be on a mobile device the AMP version is loaded. By having a slimmer and uniform codebase AMP versions of sites are able to be rendered quickly and as a bonus, when navigated to from a Google search, a cached version of the page is served directly from Google’s servers.

“ Why would I want to cede control over my pages to Google? ”
— John Gruber, Daring Fireball

A better experience for users, faster load times and Google even serves a cache of your AMP page lessening your server’s load, what’s not to love? It turns out—as with most things—the devil’s in the details. From the user’s perspective AMP is great, but from the publishers perspective AMP turned into a real estate grab by Google. AMP pages served by Google used Google URL’s masking the publishers domain. AMP’s strict adherence to Google’s pre-defined methods and layouts limited design and in some cases made it extremely difficult to use analytics and advertising providers other than Google. Not to mention that the project is open-source in name only; Google staff control the codebase 100% meaning changes not aligned with Google’s vision aren’t incorporated.

Google’s AMP turned out to be a mixed bag and one that was really more about Google lock-in and ensuring their continued domination of the web.

• The Problem With AMP, 80X24 via Daring Fireball
• Kill Google AMP before it kills the web, The Register
• A letter about Google AMP, ampletter.org
• Google AMP is Not a Good Thing, Daniel Miessler

AMP⚡ 4 EMAIL

With all the issues with AMP you might already be questioning the wisdom of AMP for Email. You wouldn’t be alone; the consensus among the email marketing community has been largely mixed at best. While we’re always striving for better consistency across email clients and more modern approaches to email—including the addition of interactivity—we loath when something is introduced that could fracture email client CSS support even further than it already is. AMP for Email could solve a lot of email designers problems but like the web version it comes with a litany of questions and glaring issues.

“ A bad joke that could potentially cede even more control over the internet to Google. ”
— Jason Meeker, RootedElm

First and foremost you should question whether we need AMP for email. Unlike the web, email can’t load JavaScript and thus typically has much less code bloat meaning faster load times. If email already has reached much of the initial stated reasons for AMP then what’s the purpose of AMP for email? Well, AMP for Email would allow for interactivity and animations in Gmail clients. With Google’s increasing marketshare of email opens it would be great for marketers and subscribers alike if Google allowed for the same interactivity as the other top 4 email clients. The problem is Google could already allow for that interactivity if it standardized it’s CSS across its email clients and allowed even a minimal subset of standard CSS animations.

LOAD TIME & DELIVERABILITY CONCERNS

AMP for Email would potentially make load times for emails even longer. When an email client downloads an email it is typically downloading two separate parts—known as MIME type—in order to render the email. One part is the HTML version and the other is the Plaintext version. Both versions are typically small in their file size meaning fairly fast load times. AMP for Email would require a third part be included in emails containing the AMP code almost doubling the size of emails being downloaded. The web version of AMP doesn’t have this concern as it doesn’t need to download the non-amp version of the webpage before rendering.

Because AMP for Email is a third MIME type it would be treated like any other email attachment by the vast majority of spam and virus firewall devices. Corporate, government, and educational institutions are typically extremely slow at updating their spam and virus filtering software not to mention being overzealous with their filtering. This could lead to emails containing AMP versions being quarantined or, even worse, not being delivered.

An AMP version also allows for the loading of JavaScript. While a giant vector for phishing, scamming, and hacking on the web this has never been a concern with email. Email doesn’t permit executable scripts forcing would be phishers and scammers to face the hurdle of getting would-be victims to visit a website first. Even with the supposed limited JavaScript that AMP for Email would permit it adds an additional security vector to emails that could lead ISP’s, government agencies, educational institutions, and other email providers to restrict or even prevent the loading of AMP versions of email.

EMAIL CLIENT/ESP BUY-IN

Because AMP for Email is open-source—despite Google’s stranglehold over the codebase—other email clients can implement AMP as well. The question is would other email clients do so. Because AMP for the web happens on the server side of the equation it doesn’t matter what web client you are using—they can all render the AMP page. AMP for Email is embedded in an email just like the HTML version, because of this the only way for that AMP version to be rendered is for email clients to read and render the AMP version is for them to release new versions of their software. For web versions of email clients this isn’t an issue as they can update their code and everyone visiting the site will use that new version. For mobile and desktop email applications this is a much bigger issue; not only do they need to release new versions of their software but users have to actively install that update.

To fully implement AMP it will mean a lot of work on the part of email clients. A lot of work to achieve something that could potentially hand their competitor a leg up. Many clients also already adhere to a large subset of standardized CSS meaning they already allow for interactivity and animation in email. In the end I suspect many email clients won’t opt to implement AMP in their software and if only Google can render an AMP email then is it really worth the extra effort to create a separate AMP version? For some subscriber bases it might be but for most marketers it won’t be worth the effort.

Even if every email client decided to implement AMP in their software marketers would still have a big hurdle to overcome. Because AMP is a separate MIME type it would mean we would have to craft a third version of every email potentially increasing workloads. An even bigger hurdle is that the vast majority of marketing email is sent via a large or enterprise level ESP such as CampaignMonitor, MailChimp, Salesforce Marketing Cloud and others. Currently these ESP’s have no way to add AMP versions of an email. They would have to invest significant time and resources to add the capability to create or add an AMP version of an email in their platform. With the potential for spotty acceptance of AMP for Email and the apparent ceding of power to Google many ESP’s might opt not to implement AMP in their platform.

AVAILABILITY

Currently AMP for Email is only implemented in some versions of Gmail’s mobile apps and sites. Which ones? Google doesn’t say. Also, not everyone can even see the AMP version even if they are on a supported version of Gmail. Like Goggle’s short lived Grid View experiment marketers must opt-in to the closed beta of AMP for Email. Unlike Grid View, Google doesn’t seem to be widely accepting applicants. In fact it doesn’t appear that anyone other than Pinterest and the others Google used to demo AMP for Email at its announcement have been permitted in the closed beta.

In the end Google’s AMP for Email seems like a solution in search of a problem. A bad joke that could potentially cede even more control over the internet to Google. Everything that AMP’s stated purpose for on the web is already accomplished in email. Its only current benefit would be the addition of interactivity and animation for Gmail clients. Interactivity and animation that Google could already achieve if they would standardize their allowed CSS matching the offerings of the other top email clients. All at the cost of adding more technical hurdles and foibles to an already precarious email landscape.

As email marketers and designers we’re striving for clients to confirm to standards, not introduce secondary layers to those standards. Time will tell, but given that Google has little control over email—they only have a 24% share of opens as of June—compared to the web I don’t see AMP taking off quickly if at all.

• AMP for email is a terrible idea, Tech Crunch
• Gmail Announces Native Support for Dynamic and Interactive Email Powered by AMP, Litmus
• Google’s Plan to Fix Email Is Deeply Flawed, New York
• On AMP for Email, Jason Rodriguez
• AMP for Email at GitHub

2017 was a banner year for email. Email client creators started acknowledging the need for more standardized support of CSS. Additional industries doubled down on their email marketing as Facebook and others continue to make it increasingly difficult—without ad buys—to reach an audience. We also saw a dramatic rise in machine learning being applied to email journeys to allow for more personal and targeted campaigns generated on-the-fly. With that in mind we think it’s time to take a hard look at what you should be thinking about for your email marketing program this year.

Better Personalization

At RootedELM, we’ve always been a big proponent of tailoring your messaging to match your audience. This year Email Service Providers (ESP’s) across the board have made available newer and more in-depth tools to help you personalize your email campaigns better than ever. Take advantage of these tools and you’ll see a marked increase in your engagement and conversion rates.

Don’t just personalize with a name, but make your content unique to the audience and your subscriber. Delivering content that’s relevant and timely results in a more engaged subscriber. So go ahead and forget the old “one-size-fits-all” campaign and increase personalization that will draw attention.

• Campaign Monitor: How to Personalize Your Marketing Strategy with Behavioral Targeting
• Salesforce: New Retail Research from 150 Million Shoppers: Personalization Drives Revenue and Results

Interactivity in Campaigns

Interactivity in email campaigns can come in many forms. While we’ve all seen retailers and even B2B companies use large animated GIFs that only scratches the surface of what you can and should be doing. From simple button hover effects to complex in-email forms, it all serves to delight the subscriber while drawing their attention to essential elements of your email.

With more significant support for CSS across the major email clients now is the time to add some interactivity to your campaigns.

• Medium: Does interactive email have a place in the B2B industry?
• Litmus: Interactive Email for Beginners: 6 Interactive Elements You Can Add to Your Emails Today
• Litmus: Interactive Email Opportunities and Challenges
• Campaign Monitor: 5 Ways to Integrate Interactive Content Into Email Marketing
• Tower Data: 6 Interactive Email Ideas for Rookies and Pros

More—and Better—Automated Campaigns

Transactional and automated campaigns consistently have better engagement rates because their content is always timely and pertinent to the subscriber. Whether it be appointment reminders, a re-marketing email or a lifecycle campaign it’s going to have a much higher chance of being opened by the subscriber.

More than half of all B2B companies use automation with even more B2C companies doing the same. With that knowledge, ESP’s made immense pushes to advanced automation tools to their product suites last year; making it an ideal time to evaluate your automated campaigns and possibly introduce more. What are you waiting for — get with your web team and get those API triggers flowing!

• Email Monday: The Ultimate Marketing Automation statistics overview
• Litmus: Q&A With Wishpond: How To Use Automated Emails To Reduce Product Churn
• Mail Chimp: How Happy Socks Spreads Happiness Through Automation

Artificial Intelligence

You might not realize it, but a substantial portion of the retail email messaging you receive has some form of artificial intelligence (AI) manipulating or creating it. AI is increasingly handling everything from the content to the subject of some marketers campaigns.

Over the years AI has become cheaper and readily available to the masses with the marketing world is making full use of it. A great way to get started with AI is to use it for better automated and personalized campaigns. Gone are the days of blindly trying to guess what a subscriber might like; let machine learning tailor the content to feature products or services that interest the subscriber. The result is a timely and relevant email that is even more tightly targeted resulting in even higher engagement.

• Venture Beat: 4 ways AI can improve email marketing
• ClickZ: How artificial intelligence is changing email marketing
• Salesforce: How to Turn AI into ROI

Better Design/Accessability

With email clients on the march towards fully embracing all CSS has to offer, now is the time to take your email design out of the dark ages. The days of no semantic markup and designing for 600px width are disappearing fast. Today we can create an email much more like a website; some people are even ditching tables all-together in their email campaigns. While most can’t take such drastic steps, it is high-time to reevaluate your templates and codebase.

With better designs, we can also build in better accessibility into our campaigns. Wrapping our paragraphs in their proper <p> </p> tags and using header tags like <h1> </h1> and <h2> </h2> can help ensure better understanding of our emails by those using screen readers. Another advantage of developing our emails with more semantic markup is that it’s easier to adjust designs to fit the device/email client it’s being read on. It also makes it easier and faster to edit emails.

• Litmus: Ultimate Guide to Accessible Emails
• Campaign Monitor: The All-New Guide to CSS Support in Email
• Type E: 06. The Web Font Issue
• Type E: 04. The Accessibility Issue
• Litmus Communities: How Litmus didn’t use tables for its first email newsletter of 2018

Issue 9
July 20, 2017

With all the emails that end up in your inbox, there are always a few that stand out. Here at RootedELM, we’re email geeks — we admit it. Whether it’s outstanding content, design or development, when we see it, we want to share it. Watch for our insight here, direct from our own inboxes, and use it to inspire your next campaign.

JASON’S PICKS

REI Co-op

SUBJECT
Ready to Get Outside?

Abandoned cart and no purchase transactional emails can be extremely engaging and profitable too. Retailers often make the mistake of making these emails seem a little creepy in nature — no one likes a stalker. REI has taken a less “stalkery” approach to their remarketing emails and crafted them so they aren’t too different from their standard marketing fare. All this while of course keeping everything branded and multiple device friendly. Proof that remarketing emails can be profitable and look good as well.

VIEW THE EMAIL SCOPE

Nike

SUBJECT
Nike Air Max for the Littlest Feet⁩⁩

For some time Nike has used a single column mobile friendly approach to their emails and just recently I noticed they’ve made the switch from all images to using webfonts and real text instead. This is great example of how a company that is very protective of their branding can create emails that are in-line with their brand and easy to read for everyone.

I also love the image choice and main title…it actually ended with me purchasing a pair for my niece.

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CHRISTINA’S PICK

American Girl

SUBJECT
This week’s AGenda: National parks for newbies

Design wise, I really love all the bright colors and I liked how the CTA buttons are translucent as the background in the two top boxes. And, as a content writer, I like how “AGenda” is on brand with the AG overall theme. It’s a perfect name for this newsletter and lends to a nice hashtag should readers choose to share photos of their adventures on social (as prompted in the email).

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LISA’S PICKS

Help Scout

Twice a week I receive a beautifully illustrated email from Help Scout. They are colorful, vibrant and unique. In fact, I recommend you read the post featured in the first email example I’ve included, titled Portrait of a Post: Illustrating the Help Scout Blog.

A couple of years ago I subscribed to Help Scout because of a referral that came out of a MarketingProfs course I took on content. Help Scout is a superb example of what a blog should be and how to promote it through email. The blog is written to help the reader think. They offer insight through stories, real life examples, experiences and tips. What I love most about these posts is that they don’t sell. It’s just really good content that drives me to click through on other pages of their website to learn more.

I’ve included two examples here to show the consistency of their emails. The friendly from name is always the author of the post and the subject is the title. For example, Sunett at Help Scout, with the return email address yourfriends@helpscout.com. The informative lead-in paragraph is typically three lines or less with a bold title. This is the only company I’ve seen use this style, but I may test it out myself in our next few emails. Help Scout always includes a clever, friction-free CTA button that intrigues me to convert. For example: “Say Sorry The Right Way” or “Get Inspired.”

SUBJECT
Portrait of a Post: Illustrating the Help Scout Blog

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SUBJECT
How to Apologize: 5 Elements of a Successful ‘I’m Sorry’

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Issue 8
June 26, 2017

With all the emails that end up in your inbox, there are always a few that stand out. Here at RootedELM, we’re email geeks — we admit it. Whether it’s outstanding content, design or development, when we see it, we want to share it. Watch for our insight here, direct from our own inboxes, and use it to inspire your next campaign.

LISA’S PICKS

Campaign Monitor

SUBJECT
How to Retain More Customers with Post-Purchase Email Automation

Being a robust email service provider, Campaign Monitor has a leg-up knowing how to build a good email to engage their audience.

I’ve noticed lately this little emoji stand out in my inbox when Campaign Monitor has a new post for me to read. Although I reference the Campaign Monitor blog often, this particular email caught my attention with the first five words in the subject line: “ How to Retain” followed by the simple pre-header of “Drive repeat purchases.”

Graphically, there is hardly anything to this email but the content is strong. In two short paragraphs, they have set up the problem and introduced a solution using “Read On” as the CTA. Sending two to three times per week, Campaign Monitor uses this branded email template with a short one to two paragraph lead-in consistently to introduce their latest insight. It’s clear Campaign Monitor has one goal — for their audience to click-through to their blog and for me personally, it works!

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JASON’S PICKS

Master & Dynamic

SUBJECT
A shipment from order #10640 is out for delivery⁩

A lot of companies don’t really make great impressions with their transactional emails, especially when it comes to shipping. A lot of times it’s more of a data issue as apposed to an email issue necessarily. I really can’t remember the last time I received a shipment notification and was surprised and delighted by it. In fact, the first email I received from Master & Dynamic informing me the new pads for my MW60 headphones had shipped got deleted. The follow-up emails however made me take notice.

While these two follow-up shipment emails could use some branding love their content more than makes up for the lack of it. By leveraging the data that most of the major shippers provide via API’s Master & Dynamic sent two additional shipment emails; one to notify that my order was our for delivery and another to notify me that it was delivered. The other nice part of their tracking CTA in the “out for delivery” email is it takes you straight to a landing page with all the tracking data and order details without pesky log-ins or asking for additional information. Both emails create a nice touch point with customers that make an overlooked process a little more personal.

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SUBJECT
A shipment from order #10640 has been delivered⁩⁩

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CHRISTINA’S PICKS

Zola Registry

SUBJECT
It’s time to think PINK

I’m not typically a girly-girl, but this pink themed email caught my attention with its simple design and rose-colored hue. The copy is conversational and fresh, including the line in the bottom panel with the social media which says, “Need help? Or just want to complain about the in-laws?” Another eye catching element is the animated iPad image under the Wedding registry segment.

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Toms

SUBJECT
Rose Gold Flamingo Print Classics

Okay, so I’m obviously into pink this week! I always love the simple, classic design of Toms emails and I’m drawn in by the catchy copy writing, including, “Whatever Floats Your Flamingo.” Shopping Toms is also a feel good experience because of their policy of giving a pair of shoes for every pair purchased. I’m not sure these flamingo print shoes are my thing, but I definitely clicked on the “Shop limited edition prints” CTA to see if there was another pair I couldn’t live without.

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Here you can create the content that will be used within the module.

Issue 7 June 12, 2017

With all the emails that end up in your inbox, there are always a few that stand out. Here at RootedELM, we’re email geeks — we admit it. Whether it’s outstanding content, design or development, when we see it, we want to share it. Watch for our insight here, direct from our own inboxes, and use it to inspire your next campaign.

Issue 6 May 26, 2017

JASON’S PICK

Meijer

SUBJECT Garden deals + $20 off a Char-Broil grill

Unlike many other retailers grocery and general store’s rely heavily on their weekly ads, mainly as their prices and selection can change on an almost daily basis. Sending these as weekly emails though tends to fall in two camps — those that try to make their email look like the print ad (all images of course) and those that try to adapt to the medium at hand. Meijer has moved over to the latter group in the past year and it’s a good example of how you can have a weekly ad campaign without a horrible experience. Meijer’s first step to decluttering the weekly ad email experience is they’ve separated their campaigns into a grocery and general merchandise weekly campaigns. This is their general merchandise campaign and — like the grocery one as well — they’ve selected several key items from their ad to feature. The large images and prices make it a clean and simple email and the subscriber always has the ability to click through to the full ad on their website. For their mobile subscribers everything collapses to keep the large images and price points and they even selectively remove items from the footer for a better layout.

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CHRISTINA’S PICK

Thirdlove

SUBJECT Bras 101 – Caring for your 24/7™ T-Shirt Bra

One of the best aspects of this email was the timing. I had recently purchased one of these bras (which by the way, comes with a “try for free” policy to guarantee the perfect fit). Several days after receiving my purchase, this email was delivered to my inbox offering step by step instructions for keeping my purchase as good as new. I like the “4 Easy Steps” complete with breezy sketches, and I’m in love with the copywriting on this one, which reads as if an older sister or friend is casually offering me advice over a cup of coffee.

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LISA’S PICK

Teavana

SUBJECT Let’s Get This Weekend (Sale) Started

What a fun subject line! It gets even better with the crafty header — “Cheers to Tea-Day Weekends filled with BBQ’s, BFFs and the Best Iced Tea Ever.” So I became super excited when I saw the survey at the bottom. It’s not asking for your favorite; the call-to-action is enticing me to try something new. At first I thought the populated survey results were stagnant images showing results from the time of send, but when I took a closer look after clicking through and refreshing my email screen, I noticed my vote counted and the percentage increased! It was dynamic (literally) thanks to images being generated at load time via MovableInk. This email uses consistent branding—from the email received to the landing page—even showing me several offers that would apply to my interests. I rate this email as an exceptional example of engaging the subscriber to obtain feedback for product interest, as well as collect data for personalization and future offers.

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