Managing Internet Addresses in Your Email Newsletter Written by Robert F. Abbott
Web and email addresses pose a special challenge for writers and publishers of email newsletters and ezines. I don’t know about you, but I find it frustrating when I have to copy and paste an address into a browser, or into a separate email window. Especially when I know how easy it is for writer or publisher to put in ‘live’ links that allow readers to reach a destination or to create a new email message. I also object to links that get contaminated by punctuation marks. I’m referring to web and email addresses immediately preceded or followed by a punctuation mark. They mean I have to copy and paste link, then eliminate offending punctuation mark before I can go on. Let’s deal with that latter issue first: If you plan to include Web addresses and email addresses, use chevron marks, which you may also refer to as less than “<“ and greater than “>” symbols. By putting them around addresses, you keep them distinct and easy to copy. It also reduces likelihood you will add a punctuation mark right after address, and make it non-clickable. Turning to other issue, it’s also easy to make your addresses immediately clickable. Do this by fully writing out URLs of Web pages and by putting “mailto:” before email addresses. For example, rather than writing www.managersguide.com , I would write http://www.managersguide.com . (note how I left a space between address and period that ended sentence). This makes URL immediately clickable; all your readers have to do is put their cursors over address and click.
| | How to Format Your Email Newsletter Written by Robert F. Abbott
When subscribers’ email readers (programs) receive your text newsletter, they will display it in all kinds of ways. Not only are there different programs, but each one has several customization options. One of problems arising out of this diversity is line length. In extreme cases, recipients will get one extremely long line for each paragraph, because their email programs have not wrapped lines (ended each line after a specified number of characters and moved text onto a new line). In other cases, lines may be too long for comfortable reading. How do you deal with this? Opinions vary, again. Some publishers recommend you hit RETURN key at end of each line (hard returns), to make sure text wraps. Others advocate setting a line length (65 characters or less) in Preferences section of your email program. If you do use hard returns, use a fixed-space font like Courier or Monaco. That way you can simply set your margins to an appropriate line length and hit return key at end of each line. If you forget and use a variable-space font (like Arial or Times), your readers will get all kinds of variations, since many of them will use different fonts. You can also change your fonts back to something you like again after putting in hard returns. Apostrophes and quotation marks: Many of us use these symbols liberally when we write, and quite frankly they improve reading process. But, be sure you use appropriate versions of these marks, which means using straight foot and inch symbols, rather than curled apostrophes and quotation marks. If you don’t do this, some of your readers will get a message in which all apostrophes and quotation marks have disappeared. It will look like you don’t know how to spell, or worse. Overcome this problem by using Find & Replace function in your word processing program to make changes quickly and easily.
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