This is the kind of fame that nobody wants, but highlighting the email marketing slips and gaffes by some of the world’s largest online retailers drives home the importance of being careful with your brand in a medium that’s high volume and lightning fast. This year’s inductees should be cautionary tales for everyone in the industry and a reminder that you need to be on your guard, temper speed with meticulousness, and be diligent with your pre-flight checklists. (Hopefully some of these oopsies will also make you feel better about some of the mistakes that you might have made last year.) Here’s an abridged selection of oopsies:
SUBJECT LINE SLIPS Subject lines once again proved to be fertile ground for oopsies, which is unfortunate since they play such a strong role in determining whether the recipient opens and engages further with the email. Errors ranged from misspellings to total FAILS.
Harry & David, 11/24 — Postcard Optin
The winner for the worst subject line oopsy was this misfire from Harry & David. And unfortunately that wasn’t the only thing wrong with this email…
TigerDirect, 2/5 — TEST: New Site Feature Coming SoonUsing placeholder language in subject lines is a bad idea. Every year I see at least one of these.
PC Connection, 3/4 — Write a Review Win An Ipod Touch!Misspelled “iPod.” Getting brand names wrong is particularly egregious and is disrespectful to suppliers.
NFLshop, 1/22 — Get Ready for the Superbowl - Conference Champs Gear - Now AvailableIf you don’t respect the spelling of your own brands, no one will. It’s “Super Bowl”—two words.
Linens ’n Things, 9/11 — Post Labor Savings Up to 54% Off!
Left out “Day” and should have hyphened “Post-Labor Day.”
Saks Fifth Avenue, 3/19 — Spring Sale New Styles Added Today!
There should be some punctuation separating “Spring Sale” from “New Styles Added Today!”
Disney Store, 10/20 — Sneak a Peak at New Disney Holiday Decor & MoreUsed “Peak” instead of “Peek.”
Lillian Vernon, 5/7 — xclusive Free Gift with Your Purchase! Hurry, Supply is LimitedMisspelled “Exclusive.”
Neiman Marcus, 12/23 — It' not too late! VIRTUAL NM GIFT CARDS in the nick of time!Misspelled “It’s.”
Lillian Vernon, 4/16 — Shop Our Customers' Favories and Get Free Shipping for Four More Days!Misspelled “Favorites.”
Avon, 11/18 — LAST DAY - Pre-Thanksgiving Sale & Free Shpping ends midnightMisspelled “shipping.”
Victoria’s Secret, 5/7 — Vote for SEXY LITTE THINGS NOIR in the 2009 FiFi Awards. Voting ends May 15.Misspelled “LITTLE.”
Costco, 10/8 — Keep your family health and safe with Shelf Reliance's THRIVE™!Left off the “y” in “healthy.”
Norm Thompson, 2/23 — $1 ship! Introducing 24 comfy, no-wrinkle outfits.
Norm Thompson, 3/7 — $1 ship + NEW JEANS with hidden slimming power!
Norm Thompson, 4/8 — FREE SHIP. Spring Pastel Party! You're invited.
Norm Thompson, 1/31 — FREE SHIP! Travel-comfy knits, best carry-ons & more.
This appears to be a stylistic issue to Norm Thompson, but I don’t see how “ship” is short for “shipping.”
Dick’s Sporting Goods, 10/22 — Congratulations Philly - National League Champions!
Needs a comma after “Congratulations” since it’s addressing Philly.
Bluefly, 10/9 — Extra 15% Off Coats Today Only – Thank You Columbus!Needs comma after “You” because it’s addressing Columbus.
Diamond.com, 10/9 — Columbus day Sale - 50% Off Plus $1 Shipping“Day” should be capitalized.
Hanna Andersson, 12/26 — Hanna BIg Big Sale Still Going - Up To 60% Off!Errant capital “I” in “Big.”
J&R, 12/8 — GIve the Gift of Music: CD Box Sets from $18.99!Errant capital “I” in “Give.”
JCPenney, 12/23 — There's still time! Get Last--Minute Gifts At A Store Near YouHad an extra hyphen in “Last-Minute.”
Coach, 6/14 — New. You can shop by shape at coach.com...and shippings freeMissing the apostrophe in “shipping’s.”
Sam’s Club, 2/8 — Know the do's and don'ts of caring for your babyMisspelled “dos” and “don’ts.”
Baby Universe, 8/9 — Buy 2, Get 3rd Free On All Baby Einstein DVD's“DVDs” misspelled.
Bluefly, 8/2 — We LOVE The 80's + PRE-FALL SALE!
“80s” misspelled here in the subject line as well as in the body copy.
Toys “R” Us, 7/4 — Up to 70% off 1000's of Toys, Plus Free Lunch Kit with Backpack Purchase“1000s” misspelled.
Ross-Simons, 3/20 — 100's of Estate Items Just Added - 25% Off Any PurchaseMisspelled “100s.”
Avon, 6/16 — What?s NEW at AVON & Up To 50% OFF + FREE ShippingLooks like a smart apostrophe found its way into this subject line, most likely because the subject line was initially composed in Word. Many email clients don’t support smart apostrophes and quotes, so it’s best to avoid them.
NFLshop, 2/4 — Special Offer + New Six Time Steelers Champs GearMissing hyphen in “Six-Time.” It’s spelled correctly on the merchandise featured in the email.
Bass Pro Shops, 6/10 — Last Minute Gift Ideas for Dad
Sportsman’s Guide, 6/15 — Last Minute Gifts for Dad! Express Shipping Coupon...
FTD, 2/14 — Get Your Last Minute Valentine Gifts - Order by 1pm Today!
Kmart, 10/30 — Save 25% on Home and Last Minute Candy Savings“Last-Minute” should be hyphenated.
REI, 12/15 — Can't Miss Gifts from REI, The North Face, Ugg and more“Can’t-Miss” should be hyphenated, as it was in the body copy.
Sports Authority, 10/30 — 1 Day Spooktacular Event - 20% Off Any Item!“1-Day” should be hyphenated.
Backcountry.com, 10/20 — Newsletter - 20% Off Code, Recession Proof Gear, Birth of a Ski, Trip of the Month
“Recession-Proof” should be hyphenated, as it was in the body copy.
Office Depot, 10/6 — 20% Off Dell Compatible Ink + 50% Off Paper“Dell-Compatible” should be hyphenated.
Coach, 7/15 — New Must Have: Gold Glam Bag from Coach“Must-Have” should be hyphenated.
Staples, 6/29 — Free delivery + wallet friendly weekly deals!
“Wallet-friendly” should be hyphenated. They had it right in the body of the email.
DEPLOYMENT MISHAPSOopsies in the deployment sphere ranged from empty emails to duplicate emails to botched A/B tests.
Hanna Andersson, 8/27 — New Fall Markdowns + Further Reductions Up To 40% Off For Back To School!This Hanna Andersson email wins the crown for most bizarre deployment mishap. Somehow the creative for Hanna Andersson’s welcome email was sent out instead of the intended back-to-school creative for this email. Very bizarre. (On the upside, it is a really nice welcome email.)
Northern Tool, 1/8 — Now On Sale -
This email from Northern Tool went out in its raw template form without a complete subject line or a product image or details. They had already sent an email earlier in the day, so I don’t believe this email was supposed to go out at all.
Harry & David, 11/24 — Postcard OptinIn addition to the wrong subject line, this email was completely empty.
eBags, 1/24 — Final Day to Save an Extra 20%: Friends & Family SaleThe body of this email was missing completely.
Ross-Simons, 4/25 — Just a Courtesy Reminder - Did you forget something?The design of this shopping cart abandonment email is pretty good, but the problem is that I never added the item listed or anything else to my shopping cart. I did clickthrough and browse the site, but I never got to the point of adding anything to my cart. I’m not sure if someone else’s cart got attributed to me or something else went astray, but this should be a reminder to audit your triggered emails periodically and make sure that the triggers and deployments are functioning properly.
Kmart, 5/26 — Final Day of the Online Memorial Day SaleThe most irrelevant email is one that arrives after the offer has expired. It appears that this email was deployed 24 hours later than it should have been or got delayed by the ISP.
SmartBargains, 12/12 — Best of BLACK FRIDAY COUPONS & FREE SHIPPING
SmartBargains, 12/12 — COUPONS & FREE SHIPPING EXTENDED UNTIL MIDNIGHTSmartBargains was apparently doing a subject line A/B test with this email and had problems with the segmentation.
NFLshop, 12/14 — Extended 1 More Day - Take 20% Off Entire Order at NFL Shop
NFLshop, 12/13 — Extended 1 More Day - Take 20% Off Entire Order at NFL ShopAccidently sent this sale extension email right after sending the first email about what was initially billed as a one-day sale.
OfficeMax, 7/23 — $30 Coupon - Save Through Friday
OfficeMax, 7/23 — 2 Days Left to Save - $30 CouponOfficeMax was apparently doing a subject line A/B test with this email and had problems with the segmentation.
Old Navy, 5/1 — Starts Today! Take $10 Off $50 Only in StoresSent the text-only version instead of the HTML version.
Gap, 5/7 — Sale - New Styles Just AddedSent the text-only version instead of the HTML version.
HPshopping, 4/6 — Shop the HP Monster Sale: ENDS SOON!This email was sent three times to at least some subscribers.
Ross-Simons, 2/4 — Hurry, Valentine's Day Sale and Guaranteed Shipping End Soon
SmartBargains, 2/10 — 10HR SALE: Up to 75% off Don't Wait & Ship Free
SmartBargains, 2/10 — 3HR SALE: Up to 84% off until 10AM Shop Now & Ship Free
J. Crew, 2/11 — 20% off any purchase of $175+...online only.
Road Runner Sports, 2/22 — Stressed Out? Relax w/ Your Choice of These Healthy Deals!
Macy’s, 3/27 — Free Shipping + save 20-50% on Spring home updates!
Cooking.com, 4/24 — Mother's Day Special Offers and Rebates + Strawberry Desserts Recipes
Buy.com, 7/2 — Samsung 37" 1080p HDTV, Acer 22" Widescreen LCD, Michael Jackson's Thriller, HP Desktop & Notebook,..
Lillian Vernon, 8/19 — Shh! This 2 Day, 2 Deal Offer is Just for You
Chadwick’s, 10/2 — Limited time offer- Shop now, PAY NEXT YEAR!
Linens ’n Things, 10/30 — Turn Back the Clock and Save 10% Off Your Order
Lane Bryant, 11/4 — Email Exclusive: 30% Off Outerwear And Boots + $4.99 ShippingAll of these emails were sent twice to at least some subscribers.
CODING & IMAGE ERRORSMistakes in coding and image formatting made for some of the most spectacular errors of 2009. There’s no missing these.
Barnes & Noble, 3/24 — This Week -- Coupons, Exclusive Twilight DVD Offer, Jonathan Kellerman, Walter Mosley, MoreEvery year there seems to be an email misfire that results in raw code or unformatted text being sent to subscribers instead of lovely rendered HTML. It happened to Sharper Image last year (see
Mar. 5, 2008 AM Inbox) and to Apple in 2007 (see
Feb. 2, 2007 AM Inbox). This year it’s Barnes & Noble.
J&R, 11/6 — BLACK FRIDAY DEALS -- Every Weekend in November!J&R celebrated Black Friday all November long, highlighting deals each weekend. The creative makes it clear that there will be four emails in the series and uses reverse type as a play on Black Friday. The white text on black background really stands out. Unfortunately, when they coded the email they had the white text start at the beginning of the preheader—which created white text on a white background, rendering their “view with images” text and whitelisting instructions effectively invisible. Only the hyperlinked “Click Here” was visible.
The reverse text misfire also affected the footer text. Fortunately, their mailing address was rendered with a gray text, otherwise they would have been in violation of CAN-SPAM.
Sears, 12/27 — Get $5 Off $50 & Shop the After-Christmas ClearanceA coding error pushed the body copy to the right, where it was truncated by width limits.
Ralph Lauren, 5/18 — FINAL HOURS To Save Up To 40% (Plus An Extra 15%)This is the third email in two days from Ralph Lauren that had no images. It was either poor coding or severe issues with their image servers.
Backcountry.com, 9/22 — A Glimpse of Ultra LifeUltra racing sounds really interesting—a great subject to dedicate a primary call-to-action to if your audience is hardcore outdoors folks. Unfortunately, I couldn’t read the article because the landing page contained errors and wouldn’t load—not on the day I received it and not the next morning. While I don’t encounter very many broken landing pages like this, I run across a ton of landing pages that are confusing, un-targeted and surely underperform. A well-designed email means nothing if the landing pages don’t work well.
Dell, 3/3 — Get Low Prices Today: Up to $339 off Select Dell ProductsThe call-to-action link in this email was broken, so it delivered me to an error message page.
JC Whitney, 6/23 — Keeping You Covered Since 1915 / Best Offer Yet!The email was missing an image and data for one of the featured products.
Lane Bryant, 11/30 — On My 1st Day Of Shopping, Lane Bryant Offered Me: Free Shipping + 40% Off OnlineLane Bryant used a dynamic content module to insert a unique discount code into this email so they could track purchases back to individual buyers—or influencers, if that code is shared with others. In this email the code is rendered in black text on a dark grey background, which may be difficult for some folks to read, instead of the intended white background. Be sure to test and make sure that your dynamic content is rendering correctly on all major email platforms, as I’ve seen similar rendering issues in recent months as more retailers have begun using dynamic content like this.
SmartBargains, 1/16 — Smart Coupons! Up to Extra 30% Off Free Shipping.Coding showing throughout creative.
Sears, 12/7 — 20% Off Dyson Kids' Licensed Gifts From $9.99 Digital Frame $79.99Repeated a content module.
Petco, 12/6 — Naughty or Nice? We've Got Presents For Everyone on Your List!Code showing in poll. The poll didn’t appear to register my selection, which makes me wonder if this coding error messed up the poll.
Ross-Simons, 11/10 — Save $5000! 3 Carat Diamond Ring- 48 Hours Only!Uses wrong image in preview pane banner, although the alt text hints that the image was intended to stress the offer is for “48 Hours Only!”
Kmart, 7/24 — Kmart Bluelight Specials: Online Friends & Family + MORE!Missing images.
Coach, 3/20 — shine with new metallic op art.Missing image.
Harry & David, 2/6 — LAST DAY for Valentine's Day arrival by standard delivery + FREE delivery on select gifts!
Missing image.
Bloomingdale’s, 11/26 — Now Until 6AM! Early Bird Gets to SaveImage alignment messed up by dynamic content. As more retailers use dynamic content, this will become more of a design issue.
Sephora, 3/14 — Portable boyfriends + free toteImage alignment problems.
Diamond.com, 12/22 — Save $425 Today Only - 1/4 Carat Diamond EarringsImage alignment problems.
Hanna Andersson, 1/8 — A Sale On ALL New Spring Hannas, Savings Start At 20% Off!Image alignment problems.
TigerDirect, 7/24 — Now $49: Turn Speech into Text w/ Dragon NaturallySpeaking 10...Save 75%...Tiger ExclusiveImage alignment problems, plus there was a misspelling further down in the copy.
Cooking.com, 7/27 — Quick Recipes for Asian-Style Chicken, Teriyaki Mains & Fried RiceImage alignment problems. A July 29 email had the same problems.
Bed Bath & Beyond, 1/9 — 20% off In-Store Savings Certificate + Storewide Clearance!Image alignment problems broke the administrative links bar.
CONTENT, SPELLING & GRAMMAR MISTAKESIncluding the wrong content, misspelling words and using poor grammar make you look foolish and distracts from what you’re trying to say.
Drs. Foster & Smith, 10/21 — FREE SHIPPING on Dog & Cat Supplies!This email was initially sent with the sender name “PROOFING,” which is another decidedly poor way to keep track of your progress on an email.
Neiman Marcus, 3/17 — Uplifting color from Carlos Falchi & more + FINAL DAY! Free online shipping at any price
I’m not sure how to say this without sounding condescending, but if you’re going to promote products and brands in your emails, make sure that you actually sell those items. The Easter collectables promoted by Neiman Marcus in this email are nowhere to be found on the landing page. Worse, a site search for “Patricia Breen,” the designer mentioned, turned up no search results. ZERO. At its roots, this is a landing page process problem, because if Neiman Marcus had even attempted to optimize their landing pages then they would have discovered that they weren’t actually selling these products.
NikeStore, 1/8 — Run Towards Your GoalsAt the bottom of this email, Nike asks subscribers to update their preferences. It’s a tactic that email marketers should use on a regular basis, especially early in a relationship and leading into the holidays when every email counts.
However, the problem that arises is that the selection of preferences that they show in the email is totally out of sync with the options that they present in their preference center. It’s confusing because the email sets the wrong expectations. It’s also easily correctable. Nike fixed the problem later that month.
Bluefly, 6/30 — Party Girl's Night Out!This banner landed Bluefly in the
Design Hall of Fame because of its innovative strategy. However, they also misspelled “shopping” in the banner’s headline, so there’s here too.
Wal-Mart, 10/5 — New October Rollbacks: Get Top Products at Even Lower PricesMisspelled “and” in subhead.
Target, 9/30 — Live large: Furniture offers, plus coupons.No hyphen in “doable.”
Cooking.com, 7/17 — Introducing Calphalon Unison Cookware“Revolution” misspelled in deck.
Diamond.com, 7/3 — Email Exclusive - July 4th SaleMisspelled “Exclusive” in header.
Sportsman’s Guide, 2/12 — Deals on Ammo & Shooting Supplies... $10 Coupon from The GuideUsed “sites” instead of “sights.” They said: “Pistol, Rifle, Shotgun... if it's Ammo you need, you've got your sites aimed at the right target!”
Toys “R” Us, 1/12 — Attention KB Toys Gift Card Holders, Get 15% Off at Toys"R"Us!Missing space in “their stores” in body copy.
HOW TO AVOID & RESPOND TO OOPSIESMistakes are unavoidable, but you can put processes in place to minimize them and to respond appropriately when they occur. Some tips:
1. Avoid production processes that invite errors, such as using placeholder sender names or subject lines.
2. Develop a pre-flight checklist and follow it every time.
3. One word: Spell-check.
4. Check all the links in the email, especially key calls-to-action.
5. View a test send in accounts from all the major email clients, or use a rendering tool, to ensure consistent rendering across platforms.
6. Have someone else look over the email before it goes out. It's difficult to catch your own errors.
7. If you make a mistake in an image, simply correct the source file.
8. Don’t resend emails that contain minor mistakes. Only resend those where the mistake has significantly impaired the message.
9. If the error is significant, see if you can halt the send. You may be able to reduce the number of intended recipients that receive the erroneous email.
10. Develop a protocol for your apology emails so you can respond quickly when serious mistakes happen.
11. Consider holding periodic post-deployment debriefings to review what went right and wrong during the email development and deployment.
To learn more from other people’s mistakes, check out the
2008,
2007 and
2006 inductees into the Oopsy Hall of Fame.
