{"id":3725,"date":"2019-11-12T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-11-12T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/blog\/5-pain-points-that-slow-down-your-email-workflow-webinar-recording-qa\/"},"modified":"2020-05-04T22:47:26","modified_gmt":"2020-05-04T22:47:26","slug":"5-pain-points-that-slow-down-your-email-workflow-webinar-recording-qa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.litmus.com\/blog\/5-pain-points-that-slow-down-your-email-workflow-webinar-recording-qa","title":{"rendered":"5 Pain Points That Slow Down Your Email Workflow: Webinar Recording + Q&A"},"content":{"rendered":"

Getting an email out the door involves a multitude of steps, tools, and stakeholders. A streamlined process keeps projects moving quickly and ensures high-quality output. A broken or labored process, on the other hand, can be damaging to your program and your team.<\/span><\/p>\n

But what slows down email workflows\u2014and where do mistakes creep in? For our <\/span>2019 State of Email Workflows<\/span><\/a> research, we asked 3,000+ email marketers how they get campaigns out the door and what challenges they face along the way. In this webinar, we shared how you can tackle these pain points head-on and provided actionable advice on how to improve your email workflow.<\/span><\/p>\n

Didn\u2019t have a chance to watch the webinar live? Don\u2019t worry. You can <\/span>access the full recording<\/span><\/a> at any time and read the Q&A below.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Q&A<\/span><\/h2>\n

A big thank you to everyone who chimed in during the webinar with a question! Here\u2019s a recap of our answers to the most popular questions, along with our take on some of the questions we didn\u2019t get to during the live webinar. Have any additional questions? Please leave them in the comments.<\/span><\/p>\n

So many emails these days are image only emails. This is way less time consuming than coding. What is wrong with doing it this way if the deliverability is still perfect?<\/h3>\n

Whitney Rudeseal Peet:<\/strong> I\u2019ve definitely been seeing a lot of image-only emails in my inbox, too. When we say that <\/span>you should never send an email that\u2019s entirely made out of images<\/span><\/a>, what we\u2019re <\/span>really<\/span><\/em> saying is that you should understand that images alone do not serve your entire audience. Images absolutely serve a purpose in email, but you might have subscribers that have images turned off by default, or people that temporarily can\u2019t load your images because they\u2019re looking through their email while commuting to work on the subway. So if all of your email\u2019s value lies in those images, that value is lost to some of your subscribers.<\/span><\/p>\n

I will say, too, that although using images for your email may make the coding step of your workflow take significantly less time, it likely inflates the design step more than you might think, so you might be coming out even anyway. Plus, if there\u2019s an error that you find during reviews and approvals\u2014or even in the middle of sending\u2014getting that error fixed will take much longer with images than it would with a quick code fix.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jason Rodriguez:<\/strong> I totally agree with Whitney. It really comes down to accessibility in its many forms. When people think about accessibility, a lot of times they think of disabilities people have. But there\u2019s permanent, temporary, <\/span>and <\/span><\/em>situational disabilities. So people impacted by email accessibility can be people with low vision\u2014or just people that are having connectivity issues on their phone. So any time you can use real live text and HTML, that will give things like screen readers more content to read out loud to subscribers, and will simply give others more content to read while they can\u2019t see your images.<\/span><\/p>\n

Is there a checklist available that we can follow to test for accessibility?<\/b><\/h3>\n

Jason:<\/strong> There are definitely some resources out there to help out. We released an <\/span>Ultimate Guide to Email Accessibility<\/span><\/a> earlier this year that works as a checklist and goes through all the things you need to worry about when building accessible emails\u2014from copywriting, design, and coding. Within Litmus, we also have <\/span>guided accessibility checks<\/span><\/a> in Litmus Checklist. It\u2019ll go through and identify any issues your email might have when it comes to things like ALT tags, hierarchy, language type, table roles, and so on. Plus, you can hear how your email sounds to a screen reader to ensure your subscribers using them can enjoy your email, too.<\/span><\/p>\n

What tools do you recommend using for an email content calendar?<\/b><\/h3>\n

Whitney:<\/strong> Here at Litmus, we use Asana for our calendar solution and it\u2019s definitely a hit with our team. It\u2019s very customizable, and it\u2019s a great way to see what\u2019s coming up at a high level across campaigns.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jason:<\/strong> Trello is another one that <\/span>a lot of people are using<\/span><\/a>. Litmus actually just launched a <\/span>new email workflow template with Trello<\/span><\/a> that you can start using today. But even if you don\u2019t have budget or access to these third-party tools, almost everybody is using a calendar through tools like Outlook and GSuite. You can set up calendar events and put campaign details and link our to strategy docs and copy docs. Regardless of what tool you\u2019re using, visibility is key. So make sure you can tag people and everyone knows exactly where to access that information so they can see it without having to bother any individuals.<\/span><\/p>\n

What exactly are partials and snippets, and what would I use them for?<\/b><\/h3>\n

Jason:<\/strong> Think of snippets as pre-saved little code components. This can be anything from the header of your email to a CTA button that you use in multiple emails. But if you go into an email and change one of these snippets, it only affects that email campaign that you\u2019re editing. Partials, on the other hand, are typically larger code blocks like logos or the footer section\u2014things that don\u2019t necessarily change often but that you use constantly. They are kept in their own files, so when you make an update to one of those partials, that update goes to all of the email campaigns it’s been used for without you having to manually go in and copy and paste those changes. Snippets and partials are built-in to Litmus Builder and really help with cutting down on the coding step of the workflow. Here\u2019s a more detailed <\/span>overview of partials and snippets and how you can use them to speed up your email development<\/span><\/a> time.<\/span><\/p>\n

What about transactional emails? Do I need to spend the time to test those? <\/b><\/h3>\n

Whitney:<\/strong> Automated and transactional emails have a reputation for being \u201cset-it-and-forget-it.\u201d But I\u2019d say for the exact same reasons you want to test all of your marketing emails before you send, you want to regularly check in on your transactional emails too. They can be affected by email client updates in the same way that marketing emails can. I feel like we\u2019ve all gotten an order confirmation or cart abandonment email that just didn\u2019t render right or left us confused. Those emails are such revenue drivers that it\u2019s incredibly important to keep those emails looking perfect, too, and testing them regularly is the way to ensure that. We typically recommend that no email should go without a solid review for more than three months\u2014the risk of delivering a rough experience to your subscribers and negatively affecting your bottom line is just too high. It\u2019s worth the time spent.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m having a hard time justifying email accessibility to the rest of my team. What\u2019s some advice you can give that helps explain why it\u2019s worth spending the extra time to make emails accessible?<\/b><\/h3>\n

Whitney:<\/strong> Making your emails accessible benefits <\/span>everyone<\/span><\/em>. Like Jason mentioned above, accessibility isn\u2019t just for those with permanent disabilities. There are temporary disabilities, like breaking your arm, and situational disabilities, like walking out in bright sunlight or traveling in the subway and losing connectivity. When you think about accessibility in this way, it\u2019s easy to see how suddenly everyone can be affected by something that\u2019s inaccessible.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ignoring accessibility not only creates frustrating user experiences, but excludes you from creating long-lasting and valuable relationships with the majority of your subscriber base <\/span>and<\/span><\/em> your future subscribers. There\u2019s so much you can do to make your emails accessible, but maybe start with baby steps. Create a plan that starts with implementing some small changes\u2014like adding language tags, or left-aligning your text\u2014that you can grow over time, so it doesn\u2019t seem like you\u2019re adding a ton of time to your workflow all at once.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the webinar, you mention focus your testing efforts on the email clients that your subscribers use\u2014but how do you know that?<\/b><\/h3>\n

Whitney:<\/strong> It\u2019s definitely possible that your ESP might not provide that kind of data. Using a tool like <\/span>Litmus Email Analytics<\/span><\/a> can help fill those gaps. What devices are your subscribers using? What version are they on? A third-party tool can help you see what your subscriber landscape looks like email to email.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jason:<\/strong> If you don\u2019t have access to a third-party tool, you can get a pretty good sense of what your subscribers are using by taking a look at your subscriber list. A lot of people might have signed up using their Gmail and Yahoo addresses, for example. You can also always find out by asking! Run an email survey and ask them for their preferences, and use that to tailor your designs and techniques to that audience.<\/span><\/p>\n

When it comes to approvals for more urgent or time-sensitive campaigns, how do you streamline approvals between multiple stakeholders from various departments\u2014and who have varying skills when it comes to using technology?<\/b><\/h3>\n

<\/b>Whitney:<\/strong> If a campaign is urgent and you need feedback and approval quickly, it\u2019s even more likely that comments get lost and errors sneak in. So if you\u2019re working at a brand where spontaneous sends and fast turnaround times are a given, it\u2019s even more important to keep all feedback in one, centralized place. A tool like <\/span>Litmus Proof<\/span><\/a> can keep feedback organized and can help keep projects moving quickly.<\/span><\/p>\n

Any recommendations for streamlining the email workflow when you\u2019re a one-woman email team?<\/b><\/h3>\n

Whitney:<\/strong> Whether you\u2019re a team of one or many, start with looking at where you\u2019re spending the most time in the production process. Is it copywriting? Is it coding and testing? Is it collecting feedback and approvals from stakeholders? Process changes at the step with the biggest time drain can have the biggest<\/em> impact on your overall workflow.<\/span><\/p>\n

Plus, always look at where you\u2019re doing the most manual, repetitive work. As a team of one, it\u2019s easy to just accept cumbersome tasks and get them out of the way\u2014because taking the time to figure out how to improve your workflow means you\u2019re stepping away from getting the next campaign out the door. But the truth is, with a team of one <\/span>automating manual email tasks<\/span><\/a> can make a huge difference for overall production time with every single email\u2014even if you\u2019re spending a few hours setting up automations.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Getting an email out the door involves a multitude of steps, tools, and stakeholders. A streamlined process keeps projects moving quickly and ensures high-quality output. A broken or labored process, on the other hand, can be damaging to your program and your team.<\/p>\n

But what slows down email workflows\u2014and where do mistakes creep in? For our 2019 State of Email Workflows research, we asked 3,000+ email marketers how they get campaigns out the door and what challenges they face along the way. In this webinar, we shared how you can tackle these pain points head-on and provided actionable advice on how to improve your email workflow. Didn\u2019t have a chance to watch the webinar live? Don\u2019t worry. We’ve got the full recording and Q&A for you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[853],"blog_category":[50],"class_list":["post-3725","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-state-of-email","blog_category-webinars"],"yoast_head":"\n5 Pain Points That Slow Down Your Email Workflow: Webinar Recording + Q&A - Litmus<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Getting an email out the door involves a multitude of steps, tools, and stakeholders. A streamlined process keeps projects moving quickly and ensures high-quality output. A broken or labored process, on the other hand, can be damaging to your program and your team. But what slows down email workflows\u2014and where do mistakes creep in? 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