HTML email from Xara - for Gmail

[Peteroz1]

I am wanting to produce a great looking email as a newsletter and sent it our from my gmail account.

Can anyone give me some step by step pointers on how to do this.

[Peteroz1]

Can anyone tell me a step by step process for producing graphic emails from xara to email out via gmail

Thanks

[steve.ledger]

Threads merged and moved to correct forum for web related discussions.

Can anyone tell me a step by step process for producing graphic emails from xara to email out via gmail

Not possible using Xara Xtreme or Web Designer.

Has been discussed a number of times.
Here's two threads:
► http://www.talkgraphics.com/showthread.php?t=42203
► http://www.talkgraphics.com/showthread.php?t=42470

[ChrisBro]

I remember both those threads and although possible I think there are a lot of issues as to why it shouldn't be done at all this way here's my take.

An email newsletter is only of any use if the recipients are actually seeing it in their inboxes, to send a newsletter via gmail or any other ISP account is well madness to be honest, if you are going down the lines of collecting email addresses for email marketing purposes then there is a certain etiquette that should be adhered to.

One of the most important points is "deliverability" ie you newsletter not ending up in spam folders and landing in inboxes where it belongs, there has been long tedious discussions about this on other forums I am a member of mostly relating to internet marketing where email marketing and deliverability are key to a businesses success. You really need some kind of double opt in solution let me explain.........

If you have a nice opt in form on your site and someone opts into your newsletter then you go on to send emails from your ISP or indeed Gmail account you will staggered to know you only need a very small percentage of your total sent email (No official figures but from some exhausted research in other places it seems to be around 1.77%) t shout spam and you end up losing you ISP or Gmail account, if you go down the route of sending them from your own hosting solution under your own domain name dont be surprised if one morning you find you host has completely pulled your account due to spam complaints. People too easily forget what newsletters they have signed up for and with anti-virus software making it far too easy for people to report spam you would be amazed how many businesses this affects.

This is where the double opt in soultion comes in, you sign upto to a "third party" solution, probably one of the biggest at the moment is Aweber.Com which have a great reputation not only with its users but also ISP's they have a 98% deliverability rate which believe me is outstanding and it is all down to this double opt in, you probably will have experienced it yourself where you sign upto a newsletter then they email you a confirmation link that you have to click on to make your membership "live", this proves beyond doubt that they has requested the information you are sending them so if they do complain Aweber can prove this and any spam complaint gets "removed" shall we say.

The other great thing with third party solutions is although your email will be shown as the senders email address it originates from their server and their IP's this is why deliverability is so good, they have people who work fulltime to ensure good relations with ISP and also spam compliance with some great tools that actually give your email a spam score before you even send it, another tool is a html editor so you can send these feature rich messages and compose them from within their site with no problems, they have templates and everything you could need to achieve your goal properly. They have lots and lots of great video tutorials walking you through everything and also a great support department to help out with anything you get stuck with.

You would include Aweber generated code in your Xara site via a html placeholder so really easy to setup opt in forms as well.

I would whole heartidly reccomend Aweber or any of the others there is a few of them if you do a bit of googling getresponse is another and mailchimp if you are on shared hosting account using a shared IP this would be the best way forward, bear in mind though they are paid servcies with a monthly fee around $20 but if you are serious about email marketing this is a very small price for all the benefits.

If you have a deidcated server with your own IP address then there is an excellent free solution called Parabots google for it you will see it, it is no longer supported so you do need to have some knowledge and be a bit capable with server side setup etc but it basically does the same as Aweber with the majority of the functions, there is a question mark with deliverability though but I have never found this an issue with a dedicated IP address, I use this myself on a few sites and actually imported my lists from aweber when I upgraded to my own dedicated servers and the results for me have been as steady as they ever were.

I hope this provides you with a better insight into what you are trying to achieve, sadly it is not just as simple as collecting email addresses and sending newsletters anymore, spam has become a huge problem over recent times and you have to protect yourself and your business from forgetfull peopl that will inevitably complain once in a while

best wishes

Chris

[Peteroz1]

Thanks Chris for you insight.

my Gmail account is actually a google apps account so is my domain and the recipients are all volunteers with our organisations, so are after the info, thus spam reporting ... is not an issue.

I am just trying to get the info to them in an engaging way, thus a pretty looking email, rather than just plain text is what I am trying to achive

Currently I am doing this out of google docs but Xara would allow me a much easier way to get it to look the way I want. Just need to figure a way to get it from xara to gmail

any ideas welcome

[steve.ledger]

In case you missed the links in my earlier post.

This is a way I have found that can work.

[1] Create Xara html page
[2] Publish to web
[3] Open page in Google Chrome
[4] Ctrl+A to select all and copy top clipboard
[5] Open Gmail and compose new mail
[6] Ctrl+V (Paste) to past from clipboard

It does take planning though. Not all designs will work WYSIWYG.
Some email clients may mis render it.
This is the only way you can do it because Gmail is a web based editor.

[angelize]

I have to agree with Chris. The e-mail marketing etiquette is important many countries have anti spam laws and if you don't follow proper etiquette for building your list and providing an option to unsubscribe you could find yourself in a whole heap of trouble. Html e-mails are one thing that Xara can't do.

I have recently started using MailChimp which has a free option. Their Forever free account gives you access to all all the same tools and templates as the paid account, the only difference is in the amount of e-mails you can send out per month and the amount of subscribers you can have. Another thing that Mailchimp provides is tracking. You can see how many times your e-mail was opened and who opened it.

I design all my graphics in Xtreme Pro 5 and import them as pngs into mailchimp with no problem. I was able to embed the sign up form into my website that was created in Xtreme via the placeholder option.

[bexvlad]

Thanks, Sledger! That's so simple, and I have been knocking my brains out using Premailer and stripping out all unwanted content. However, every other solution seems to mess up text panels (they look fine in the Thunderbird 'create mail' window but arrive in a mess on T'bird and absolutely all over the place on Gmail.

Do you have any experience of sending volume mailings via Gmail? It's not something I would have considered before.

[mikehihn]

Here's the easiest way, and also includes email tracking -- who opened and did they click.

Go to MailChimp.com Yes, that's their name. They have a "forever free" email and database that does everthing, including keeping your addresses up to date, up to 2000 subscribers. All these services use templates, and this one allows you to upload your own html template. And, of course, you can create your own subscription form.

I'm a marketing guy who does websites, not a website guy. I create custom templates and open an account for all my clients. They are also VERY beginner friendly, like Xara, with simple tutorials. MailChimp even warns you if you have any phrases that might trigger a spam filter.

Finally, I'm at a loss to understand so many people saying it's wrong to use email templates. Perghaps in other countires, but in the US EVERY email is in a template (except purely personal ones). It's professional.