Melinda Baxter, Director of Marketing Services
Here’s a common question I receive. “Wow! Movies in email! Company X says it’s easy, and we should partner with them to do it. They say our clicks and sales will increase madly!”
First, here is some clarity around the technology picture:
Our whitepaper “Email Marketing Design & Rendering: The New Essentials” talks about this directly on page ten: “Embedding Flash or video in email will cause major deliverability issues. If delivered, these design elements will be stripped or disabled. If you want to use rich media, use a screenshot of the media linking to the “live” version on your website. Animated .gifs are also alternatives that work across many – but not all – email clients”
Next, I’ll focus on the impact:
ExactTarget customers (and even ET ourselves) regularly leverage videos to engage subscribers. We don’t do this by embedding the video in the email, but by linking to the video. Our own “InSight” newsletter has used this technique. Some of our customers have found that linking to video generates the highest clicks in their email – this is an excellent thing to test! The success is generally related to the relevance of the video content to the subscriber, and it’s not always a silver bullet.
We have customers that use videos to link to product demos on their web site, fashion show footage, “how to” instructional videos, CEO messages, etc.. Some have such success with videos as an engagement technique that they tease it in their subject line to increase open rates. Others have tested it against Q & As, with the Q & A format outperforming the video.
"How Stuff Works" features a video in prime real estate each newsletter (btw - I think this is a very fun newsletter to read!):
Advance Auto Parts also links to "How to" videos each newsletter, along with other interactive links...
Like any other engagement technique to increase subscriber interest and involvement in your email and brand, test it to learn what performs best for your subscribers.
Got the picture?
Posted by: Dave Morse on Thursday, October 30, 2008
Thank you for this article! Someone on our sales team recently said, "Hey, we should feature our latest TV commercial embedded within an email campaign, so it plays on open". I knew it was not advisable, and quoted your comments in my response.