HTML Stationary?

ButtermilkJack

Hope this is the right place for this...

I've been asked by a client to covert their letterheads into HTML stationary for MS Outlook. What I'm wondering is how advanced Outlook is terms of HTML/CSS. Can I use inline/embedded CSS or do I have to stick to strictly HTML for all styling?

Also, do I link to all images locally, or should I upload them to my clients server and tell Outlook to look for them from there? How does Outlook deal with the sending of the images? Are they sent with the message?

Also, any other tips would be appreciated

Thanks!

seamus

You can use inline CSS, but I would strongly recommend using tables for layout and CSS for basic styling. Outlook's support is basic at best. Try to use minimal images - Outlook 2003 by default will not download href'd images with a mail, screwing up the mail if the recipient can't grasp the concept of "blocked images". If you can, substitute images with colors and text, IMHO.

ButtermilkJack

Cheers seamus. I will have a max of 5 gif's/jpg's. One will be the overall header for the conference. Followed by 2 or 3 paragraphs of text. Then it's just the logo of the company and 2 or 3 sponsors logos. The rest will be basic css styling (eg: borders/font colours/background. Nothing too fancy).

Am I right in saying that if I use a relative path to the images in the stationary folder, then Outlook will collect them and send them with the message? (I agree with your point about users and blocked images... that would unneccessarily complicate things )

Thanks again.

mneylon

You will probably need to test this in several email clients, as not everyone uses Outlook (unless you are 100% sure that none of the recipients are using anything else)

ButtermilkJack

I was just asked by the client to make up the stationary so they can send it from Outlook, because that's what they use.

I think they are aware that not everyone uses a html email client (I will make them aware of it either way) but that is a receiving issue which I am not really responsible for. In other words, I cant make sure everyone is setup to receive the mail properly. I reckon that would be up to them. They should have a choice for their clients to receive html or plain text. If they want to 'blanket-send' in html format and hope for the best then that's their choice at the end of the day.

Not trying to sound lazy or irrespnsible but all I can do is write the HTML, the rest is up to them.

In terms of sending though, surely it shouldn't matter what email client the recipient has (ie: the mail will 'send' correctly from Outlook anway?).

ButtermilkJack

Sorry, just realised I may be missing something here.

Is the stationary option in Outlook specific to Outlook, or just a way of sending HTML emails?

In other words, something sent by Outlook doesn't need Outlook to view, it does it?

mneylon

It's an outlook specific way of sending. The problem will be viewing it.

ButtermilkJack

blacknight wrote:

It's an outlook specific way of sending. The problem will be viewing it.

Ok, so would I be better advising them to send a normal HTML email rather than an 'Outlook Stationary' email?

TempestSabre

Put it to you this way. Any smart person will have the option to recieve HTML mail turned off as its a security risk. Its also increases the traffic on your network and uses extra bandwidth. So by sending HTML email a company might think its giving off a "high tech" and professional vibe. But really all you are saying is we really don't have a clue. You should give people the option of recieving HTML or plain text, and a link to the ad on the website. These things are usually marketing mailing lists. It pretty much the same thing as junk mail through your door.

mneylon

TempestSabre - that's a bit extreme. There's nothing wrong with sending HTML email newsletters and marketing mails if you do it properly.

TempestSabre

blacknight wrote:

TempestSabre - that's a bit extreme. There's nothing wrong with sending HTML email newsletters and marketing mails if you do it properly.

Maybe. Kompletts one is a good model. You get a choice of which one you want, and the plain text links back to the weekly special. Hate dealing with clients who want these. They don't get the idea that a large % of people won't see them as designed. So they come back you moaning about it, after you've explained it for the nth time. :mad:

Anyway if the client wants them send them. Outlook stationary AFAIK comes as attachments, however I personally find that HTML mails work better. (if I'm forced to use them). Our corporate firewall at work sometimes goes gagga and block certain emails with attachments, so people have to get them released. I've seen some places now attach PDF's instead to ensure that the layout is preserved as desired.

Still its for a conference, thats not too bad I suppose. :cool:

I still get a kick out of emailing people replies and including their original carefully crafted HTML utterly destroyed by conversion to plain text.

ButtermilkJack

TempestSabre wrote:

...Its also increases the traffic on your network and uses extra bandwidth. So by sending HTML email a company might think its giving off a "high tech" and professional vibe. But really all you are saying is we really don't have a clue....

I don't think adding a 3k gif to a 5k text email is excessive bandwidth usage but I accept that you have to know what you are doing. All these people want is a basic idenity template for their outgoing emails. A 'digital letterhead' so to speak!

TempestSabre

ButtermilkJack wrote:

I don't think adding a 3k gif to a 5k text email is excessive bandwidth usage but I accept that you have to know what you are doing. All these people want is a basic idenity template for their outgoing emails. A 'digital letterhead' so to speak!

Well if thats all then no. I would have expetcted more of the 30k-50k range and emailing it to a few thousand users. I know its not a mailing list but I have those stuck in my head. When I was involved in it, we rarely had mailing lists of under 5k recipients.

ButtermilkJack

I actually have another job to do which is a 30k - 50k email which will be sent to roughly 1000 recipients, but for the moment it's just the HTML stationary.

I tested one last night through Outlook Express by just modifying an existing .htm template in the Stationary folder. Everything worked fine, it just grabbed the logo from the same directory and sent it along. I sent it from OE (PC) to Thunderbird (PC)

Also, I decided to reply in 'plain text' format just to see how things would look and it was fine. It just stripped out the logo and formatting and left the message with the contact details attached. Which is fine.

rsynnott

Most people hate html email. I'd steer well clear if I were you.