Big Pane in the Ask

Uh, preview pane that is.

Email Labs is the coolest standalone email provider I’ve seen and also provides some of the best free research.

They did a study last fall of their newsletter readers (an admittedly business-y crowd) that showed that 7 in 10 of their readers frequently used preview panes to pre-screen their emails. And half of the survey routinely blocked all email images and html from loading.

First of all, no wonder open rates are tanking.

Second, you need to design your emails to be preview-pane friendly, and to to not look like total crap if the graphoics don;t load. The nice people at Email Labs offer some specific guidance, and ideas for testing.