Should We Use Text or HTML in Our Messages?
Posted: May 8th, 2007 | Author: Matt Levenhagen | Filed under: E-Mail Marketing | No Comments »When I first started e-mail marketing several years ago I did start out using html and text together. The e-mail service I was using would recognize if someone didn’t want or couldn’t get html and would then serve them text (I guess.. beyond my technical knowledge as to how that possible, but sounded good and I didn’t seem to run into any complaints). 
But when I moved to aWeber, I started using text only. And I’ve never had a problem in that department.. the only thing I missed was being able to track when e-mails were opened. Tracking clicks isn’t a problem because I run those through my redirect software anyway.
But then.. there is the aesthetic value of html e-mails and the ability to treat it more like a web page. The ability to use hyper-links is a good thing.
Late last year I decided to try html with one of my internet business related lists. No sooner did I start sending html did I get one guy that told me if he sees html he automatically thinks it’s spam and another asked me if I could send them the text version instead.
Now.. I can actually create both with aWeber and if they don’t except html it will serve the text. But that’s to much like work! 
Maybe I should and could and maybe I will do that at some stage, but I’ll just tell you that..
..I’m back to plain text with that list.
But.. for non-internet marketing related niches I haven’t had any issues. Why is that?
I think I know why. I think internet marketers and business related people are so inundated with spam because they are on 500 lists and giving their e-mail out to everyone and their mother. So they do get spam and spam (phishing or whatever) comes in the form of html… many times.
So the more internet savvy, I’m in front of the computer 10 hours a day, type people probably are more inclined to like text. Plus, in the IM and Biz related niches we are used to text. Most of the e-mails I get from marketers are text based.
Web Development sites.. bigger, more popular sites.. I’ll receive html from.
So it’s really the type of list you have that is going to determine what you should send.
There is no right or wrong.. there is only you testing it and determining what’s best for your list.
As I said above, I have non-internet marketing related lists where this isn’t an issue and if you look around those niches at other newsletters etc, they are generally html so people are used to it.
In fact, that’s maybe your answer. Define your niche and see what others are doing in your niche.. are they using html or text? If it’s a popular niche and there are established lists, chances are they already tested this for you.
The reason I chose this topic because I ran across a good post at aWeber on this very topic.
Find it Here: Should I Use Text or HTML
It’s a good read.. and there are some good comments after the article as well.
And now.. You know my thoughts on the topic. What do you think? What’s your experience?
-Matt Levenhagen
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