[thelist] Email Newsletters and Stylesheets

Bob Meetin bobm at dottedi.biz
Sat Dec 5 11:38:58 CST 2009


Joel Canfield wrote:
> On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 9:01 AM, Bob Meetin <bobm at dottedi.biz 
> <mailto:bobm at dottedi.biz>> wrote:
>
>     So do you go into this with the set expectations that it will
>     "break" for some/many email programs (in spite of inline styles)
>     and the folks who use them are possibly used to this, thus you
>     offer the accomodation of the URL to read it?  
>
>     Do programs like MailChimp use inline styles or what?  I'm not
>     hearing nods (this is the weekend I know) that adding a short
>     in-document style section in the head is a satisfactory option.
>
> All the tools we use (Campaign Monitor, Constant Contact, Feedblitz, 
> others) include a 'read online' option as URL, and all include styles 
> in the head of the document (or allow them inline) 
>
> so, adding a short in-document style section in the head is a 
> satisfactory option
>
> curious: why are you building this? wondering if you're reinventing 
> the wheel or creating something new.
>
> joel
"not building" not at all. 

The newsletter program I am configuring is a Joomla component, works 
well in that regard.  However the disconnect comes in trying to set it 
up so that it is reasonably bulletproof for clients to use.  With the 
CMS, probably other CMS as well, you have a choice of WYSIWYG editors to 
install and configure (as well). 

But because some/many of the email readers may not see the external 
stylesheet, although I can set up custom styles to be used through the 
formatting toolbar and a CSS dropdown I need to be clear on how these 
styles will be incorporated into the document.

Q: Why not use an external program? 
A: Self-sufficiency and one stop shopping, the goal being a single database.





-- 
Bob Meetin
www.dottedi.biz
303-926-0167
www.Twitter.com/bobmeetin

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