I've been online for over 5 years, and designing sites for 4, so I'm almost embarrassed to ask this.. but what's the proper method for sending HTML e-mails?

The reason I've never sent one is because of all of the security risks and compatibility issues involved, but I have a new client that's hell bent on sending his customers pictures of new items, details, etc. I can understand why he'd want to do that, so here I am. I've tried just sending the raw html code, but it shows up to the receiver as text. I've also tried sending the html document as an attachment, but that doesn't always work. What am I missing here?

I use outlook
:D

you can bring up the html tab sort of like frontpage with view source edit and preview

thanks for the reply.
so, Outlook aside... there's no specific tag to add to the e-mails?

I only ask because people send me bulk e-mails and newsletters all the time with HTML, and I'm 90% sure they're not from Outlook.

You can write php scripts to send html emails. With the mail() command, you just have to declare the content type, like

html = "MIME-Version: 1.0\r\nContent-type: text/html; $newsletter";
mail("$member[email]", "$subject", "$html", "FROM: $ownersemail");

hmmmm, that's not a bad idea. I may just install a php mailing list script that will allow him have all kinds options for his clients. I should have thought of that sooner.

Ah well, I was just hoping there was a quick and dirty method of sending one from a regular webmail account. :(

Justice,

The vast majority of sites that consistently send HTML mail for their mailing lists use mailing list managers like Topica and other software. HotScripts (http://www.hotscripts.com) is always a good place to check out if you're in desperate need of a decent mailing manager.

yeah, HotScripts is where I get all my scripts from. thanks

Personally, I hate HTML emails. HTML, imho, is for websites and not emails. Plain text is for emails :liplick:

I agree 150% matt, but he wants his customers to see big bright pictures of his products when they click the e-mail.

I just spent about 2 hours at Hotscripts. I can't find a script that allows me to send an html e-mail to one person at a time. it's all mailing list managers that send bulk mails. He wants to send personalized messages.

anyone got any ideas?

Try downloading GroupMail . http://www.infacta.com/gm.asp . They have a free version, and you can buy the more advanced version if you want more features. I use the free one.

It allows you to import or manually enter all the email addresses in your mailing list. You can then very easily send out personalized emails to everyone. If you configure it, it will automatically put the recipient's name into the body of the email, wherever you want it. It'll customize the email however you want.

And you want to send HTML emails? Piece of cake. Type in a plain text message, and attach an HTML message. All recipients who are set up to receive HTML mail will see the HTML newsletter. Everyone else will see the plain text one by default.

Hope that helps.

Vito

This may be one worth checking out for you too

http://www.yourmailinglistprovider.com :D

vito, Group Mail looks like a great program. Unfortunately I need something web based. thanks though

Martie, that one's remotely hosted. I'll keep looking. thanks for the reply

http://mail.yahoo.com

Send Email > Type the html code you want in the body box thingie using full html code > press the SEND AS HTML radio button > press send :D

damn.. I didn't know yahoo offered that. I hope they handle POP e-mail accounts from the web. I don't think he wants "...@yahoo.com" showing up as the sender.

thanks Mester

hmmmm their POP3 system seems to only work for retrieving e-mails. ah well, I'm still on the hunt!

What's wrong with Outlook or Eudora?

Originally posted by Justice
vito, Group Mail looks like a great program. Unfortunately I need something web based. thanks though

Ah.

I wrote a web based email client once, that supported reading html emails, but never did add the ability to create an HTML email.