This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.

Foursquare

Type: Welcome Home triggered email
Send date: 3/2013
Subject line: Welcome back from your trip! How was it?

“Not only does this email use responsive design to target Foursquare’s highly mobile users, it is triggered by check-in patterns that involve airports and locations outside of my normal stomping grounds.”
—Kristina Huffman, Design Practice Lead

View this Foursquare email on Pinterest >>

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Crutchfield email >>

Crate & Barrel email >>

This Foursquare email...

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.

Moosejaw

Type: Promotional email
Send date: 1/7/2013
Subject line: It worked for Obama...

“A catchy, intriguing, topical subject line introduces a mobile-friendly, plain-text email that’s well-suited to convey the concise message. Both this email and the text-heavy emails of the campaign season are reminders that plain text can still be very effective, particularly in the age of mobile.”
—Laura Earley, Associate Designer

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Icelan...

1. Foursquare's Awesome Virtual Map / Time Machine 

Kind of creepy, just not really creepy.

The animation flies you around all those haunts you've visited in times past, served up in a lovely 3D effect that you can autoplay to your heart's content. You can zoom in or out of its map showing all the places you've been, checking out each of your check-ins. The interface helpfully provides places Foursquare has recommended for you as well. (via Mashable) 

2. Apple is Back, Jack

- WDDC (Apple's Wordwide Developers Conference) was this week and it looks like the technology power brand has some kick...

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.

Jack Spade

Type: Promotional email
Send date: 3/21/2013
Subject line: Watch Out! $98 Graphic Watches Are In

“Clean simplicity is the new sweet spot for email design and this email delivers by keeping the headline and call-to-action above the fold and using a mix of illustration and product shots to intrigue and get subscribers scrolling.”
—Anna Meier, Design Consultant

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Jonathan Adler email >>

Sephora email >>

This Jack Spade...

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.

Jetsetter

Type: Preference eenter

“Jetsetter’s preference center collects subscriber preferences for ‘Destinations’, ‘Activities’, and ‘Scenes’, all of which are vital to creating highly targeted travel offers. Their preference center also addresses three of the most common reasons that subscribers opt out—too many emails, irrelevant emails, and change of address.”
—Submitter: Andrea Smith, Design Lead, Content Marketing & Research

View this Jetsetter preference center on...

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.

CB2

Type: Promotional email
Send date: 12/1/12
Subject line: get her this

“Gift guides are a major selling tool during the holiday season. CB2 takes this concept and turns it into a fun, interactive decision tree that all starts with rating the gift-recipient on a scale of 1 to 10. It’s hard to resist following every path to its recommended gift.”
—Ryan Alvis, Design Consultant

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Tiffany & Co. email >>

Canadian Tourism Commission...

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.

IVCi

Type: Promotional email
Send date: Q2 2013
Subject line: IVCi conversation

“While most emails work best as HTML emails, we’ve found that drip emails are the most successful when they’re in a rich text format, which makes them appear as though they’re a one-to-one communication between a sales rep and a prospect. This email from IVCi is short, conversational, and includes a personalized signature to enhance the impression that the email is coming directly from a sales rep.”
—Mathe...

There’s no question about it: email is the foundation of successful B2B marketing strategies.

In 2012, BtoB Magazine reported that 59% of B2B marketers rank email as the #1 tactic for generating revenue and predicted that in 2013 spending on email by B2B marketers would increase 65%. A big reason more B2B marketing budget is flowing to permission-based email is that 57% of marketers say email newsletters are their most effective tool for lead nurturing. (Source: MarketingSherpa 2013 Email Marketing Benchmark Report)

B2B Email Marketing at its Best
One brand that, in my opinion, is a best-in-class...

1. Smart Phone Penetration Hits over 50%. In 2012, eMarketer estimates, "six countries—South Korea, Norway, Sweden, Australia, the UK, and the US—saw smartphone user penetration rates among users rise above 50% for the first time. In regional terms, only North America will boast average smartphone penetration rates above 50% in 2013 among mobile users, as Canada crosses the 50% mark this year. Western Europe as a whole will cross that boundary in 2014."

2. mCommerce and the Mobile Transaction. For the B2C brands, mobile payments have already revolutionized the way consumers pay for products....

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.

Kickstarter

Type: Promotional email
Send date: 1/8/13
Subject line: The Best of Kickstarter 2012

“The email is super simple and super straightforward. With a headline, three sentences, and a three-character call-to-action, the email provokes interest and propels the subscriber to the rich, slideshow landing page.”
—Chris Studabaker, Regional Manager, Global Services

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Tumblr email >>

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This email is part of the...

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.
 

Bendon Lingerie

Type: Promotional email
Send date: 5/8/13
Subject line: Something extra for you: buy any 2 items, get the 3rd free.

“Rather than seeing image blocking as an obstacle, this Australian lingerie retailer saw it as an opportunity to use a mosaic of color blocked table grids to send a simple heart-shaped message. While many marketers use mosaics to emulate the images-on creative, Bendon Lingerie chose not to be limited by that.”
—Kirk Barlow, Senior Deliverability &...

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.

Reiss

Type: Promotional email
Send date: 4/14/2013
Subject line: Textured Summer Knits + London Lives Video

“Designed in nice screen-sized chunks with large images and big buttons, this “mobile aware” email is perfect for tablets, but still functional on smartphones. Unlike many brands, this UK retailer also made their navigation bars at the top and bottom of their email mobile-friendly.”
—Abul Kashim Siddique, Senior Design Consultant, EMEA

View this Reiss email on Pinterest >>

This...

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.

Anthropologie

Type: Promotional email
Send date: 3/15/13
Subject line: Denim on the rise | Free shipping

“This email proves the adage that a picture’s worth a thousand words by making it super easy to see at a glance the difference between Anthropologie’s different denim styles. For good measure, they also include some words, offering advice on what to wear with each style.”
—Chad White, Principal of Marketing Research

View this Anthropologie email on Pinterest >>

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Lan...

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.

Levi’s

Type: Promotional email
Send date: 4/9/13
Subject line: Denim Die-Hards‏

“Partnering with fashion website Refinery29 to get their interpretation of 501 jeans for the photo gallery presentation in this email is just the beginning of this social-driven campaign. Subscribers are asked, ‘What’s your interpretation?’ and encouraged to upload photos of themselves styling 501s, and ultimately asked to vote on a Pinterest-inspired landing page to determine which finalist is the...

I'm excited to start a new series on the ExactTarget blog centered around the hottest digital marketing stories and trends of the past week. We will publish a new list at the beginning of every week. Just to be clear, this is a blatant rip-off of the BBC series. 

1. The Power Behind Waze and Mapping: Waze was on the tip of many tongues last week with rumored bids from Apple and Google. Why is there so much buzz about Waze? The company, which initially launched in Israel, provides crowd-sourced information. Users can wave their hands over their mobile device while driving to vocally report...

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.

Zulily

Type: Welcome email series
Send date: Q1/2013
Subject lines:

1st welcome: Get shopping credit! Invite your pals to join zulily too
2nd welcome: Go ahead ... play favorites
3rd welcome: Anytime. Anywhere. Take zulily with you.
4th welcome: Calling all social butterflies
5th welcome: Smart shopping is your superpower

“With the vast majority of marketers still sending a single welcome email, Zulily is well ahead of the curve with this five-email welcome series that seeks a closer...

This is one in a series of columns exploring the examples and trends highlighted in The Best of the Email Swipe File.

TOMS Shoes

Type: Promotional email
Send date: 4/12/2013
Subject line: New Ballet Flats & free shipping on all orders!

“The really interesting thing about TOMS’ use of responsive design in this email is that the hero image is animated only in the narrow screen version, with the shoes changing as the feet push back and forth. They are serving up a mobile-sized gif instead of cramming a desktop-sized gif onto a mobile screen, keeping the load time as quick as possible.”
—Kristina...

With all of the different email clients out there it can be difficult to account for all of their quirks. You expect that your email will look slightly different in Gmail than it does in Hotmail, but did you know that the browser you use can affect the display as well? Hotmail, in particular, behaves differently in Internet Explorer than it does in Firefox.

When using Hotmail in IE, properly coded HTML will display as expected, but some issues appear when using Hotmail in Firefox. If you’ve ever noticed extra space underneath your images like the screen shot below you are not alone. The Hotmail...