An excellent mass email program

**jon404** · 05 February 2020, 05:12 AM

Retired now, I do tourism development for the City of Tombstone, Arizona... and also fundraising for my church.
Found an absolutely excellent mass email program called ActiveCampaign... easy to use compared to Mailchimp, Constant Contact, or GetResponse. And best at getting the message to Inbox instead of Junk or Spam. Perfect display on Apple or Android smartphones, where 85% of my folks are getting their info these days. I like mass email -- gets you out of the Facebook swamp, back to having control over the message with lots of ways for customer interaction.
A big change -- everything you've learned about design, about typography... well, almost everything... forget it. You have a limited selection of fonts to use. Want something different? Include it as a JPG. Thing is, your customers don't care about design or a perfect font selection. It is all about a short, strong headline... like FREE BEER! with related square or landscape-aspect graphics, some more text, an offer, etc. Simple scores big here. People don't read much anymore -- keep text blocks short, write at a 10-year-old comprehension level.
Psychologically, it's an interesting shift from worrying about design & layout -- to being able to concentrate on only the selling message, as it's impossible to do much by way of design.
Historically, well. Some say that each iteration of a technology cheapens the output while lowering the cost of production. Who knows. Financially -- I was taught years ago that the only thing that mattered in an ad was getting customers to the client's door. And ActiveCampaign really delivers on that. Recommended.

**gwpriester** · 05 February 2020, 02:35 PM

Good to know. Things are pretty dead in Tombstone, aren't they?

**Gypsyjoe** · 05 February 2020, 07:48 PM

Originally Posted by gwpriester

Things are pretty dead in Tombstone, aren't they?

Lol

**handrawn** · 05 February 2020, 07:54 PM

tombstone is a real place

mass mailing... as long as its not cold... ok

**pauland** · 05 February 2020, 10:42 PM

So are these mailshots to subscribed people who have agreed to be sent email?

I ask simply because without that permission, if people were to complain mail servers can be blacklisted.

**Gypsyjoe** · 05 February 2020, 11:08 PM

Dumb question, but where would one complain in the first place that would get a mail server blacklisted?

**pauland** · 05 February 2020, 11:14 PM

Originally Posted by Gypsyjoe

Dumb question, but where would one complain in the first place that would get a mail server blacklisted?

Not at all dumb - it may not be so easy.

You would need to look at the origin of the email and see who is responsible for the domain and server. There will be an admin address and sometimes a contact to complain to.

All emails sent out in a mass mailing should include an option to unsubscribe.

If it's some small church group, etc then perhaps it doesn't matter, but if you send out 10,000 it will be wise to do it properly.

Of course the bad guys use servers in countries who could care less.

**Chris M** · 06 February 2020, 05:03 AM

Originally Posted by pauland

...who could care less.

I have never understood why anyone would mention that they care when they are clearly trying to portray they don't. I've even gone as far as searching the Internet (which is never incorrect) and the only answer I can come up with is Americanisation.

The very British, tongue in cheek David Mitchell describes my way of thinking way better than I can. https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_c...ature=emb_logo

**pauland** · 06 February 2020, 08:41 AM

Originally Posted by Chris M

I have never understood why anyone would mention that they care when they are clearly trying to portray they don't. I've even gone as far as searching the Internet (which is never incorrect) and the only answer I can come up with is Americanisation.

"Could care less" is a typical British phrase and it means exactly what it says - the person could not care less - so it's not trying to be clever and imply that the person does care through some clever phraseology. "Could care less" means the person does not care. I guess that one of the common forms of usage of "could care less" omits the "not" and that's where your interest in the phrase comes from.

The very British, tongue in cheek David Mitchell describes my way of thinking way better than I can. https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_c...ature=emb_logo

I like David Mitchell but I am at a loss as to the relevance of the clip. As far as Americanisation goes, I am as British as David Mitchell is, but he does win when it comes to Englishness. He is a lot of fun on a game show called "Would I lie to you?" in the UK and also pops up on many other shows. I would say his style is "posh, clever wordplay" and he is generally a joy to listen to.

I'm not sure if this post helps anyone or not!

Paul (British not American).

**Chris M** · 06 February 2020, 09:45 AM

Originally Posted by pauland

"Could care less" is a typical British phrase and it means exactly what it says - the person could not care less

Here's my dilemma: could care less = couldn't care less???

Mr Mitchell explains the problem at 50 seconds in, including a graph. I don't know the gentleman, nor the show, I just liked the way he explained situation. He also verified my thoughts, so he has to be a good egg