Lately there has been a great deal of interest in adding Flash to
your everyday run-of-the-mill email so you can send it to your clients, prospects
or newsletter subscribers. Marketing has descended from upon high and declared
it, the small business client wants it, or an executive in management has read
about it.
Well, why not?
The fact of the matter is that email HTML
browsers are just not equal to their web browser equivalents.
This is further made complex by the wide variety of settings,
preferences, security updates, versions, and third-party
applications which make the user experience hard to predict.
This is an interesting problem to contend
with when creating, designing and marketing your HTML
email. Most likely you are about to hate what I am about
to say, however, please do not shoot the messenger.
You should never use Flash or any other rich media piece in your
HTML email unless you absolutely know that the email client your recipient uses
can handle
Flash content. Further, you should only send Flash/rich media content to someone
who has requested it, or you have an agreed upon marketing relationship. The
first time that I had to wait almost an hour to download what turned out to
be a Flash email, I was on a hotel dial up account. That one Flash email cost
nearly $10.00 and an hour of my time.
Not exactly the relationship you want to
enter into with your customers or clients.
So if you absolutely have to send Flash
content via email, here are a few tips you should remember.
Do not try to control your Flash with active scripting
Due to the wide variety of email clients, browsers, security settings,
updates, and service packs installed, it is difficult to predict how a script
will execute against any given email client. JavaScripts can cause browsers
& Outlook 2000 to
disable any active scripting contained in an email document (there has been an increase
in email security due to malicious scripts).
You're better off attaching or sending a link
The majority of web-based email clients (Hotmail, Yahoo!, etc.)
will strip out your Flash content. It
is not uncommon to send embedded Flash content only to have the recipient open
it in their web-based client and see
absolutely nothing.
You also cannot rely on a <NOEMBED>
to provide an alternate link for the content. You will
need to include a text link before or after your Flash
content for all Web-based recipients and those whose systems,
ISP, network security, or other variables interfere with
their viewing of Flash content.
By sending your Flash content as an attachment or a link, you
can work around some of these limitations imposed by making the Flash content
render in the browser rather in your email. That way, if your recipient has
the plugin, they can view the Flash file.
Make sure your files do not immediately start playing
Control your content with an onClick, or
other event. Just a nice "Click here for an important
message." is all you need. Allow the viewer to start
the presentation when they are ready. A Flash or Shockwave
piece, which begins streaming if viewed in an Outlook
preview window, will start a second time when the email
is opened. This will usually cause quite a mess with the
recipient's sound system, not to mention distort your
intended message.
Nothing will get your Flash email deleted
quicker than if it causes unexpected sounds to suddenly
come pouring loudly from the recipient's computer during
the workday.
These are just a few things you should watch
out for if you plan to design, send and expect responses
to your Flash emails.
Flash & other rich media may all be
year 2001 — "bleeding edge" for the world of
web browsers. Unfortunately your average HTML email browser
seems stuck at about early 1998.
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