You know what they say: when there’s no picture to say a thousand words, learn to write! HTML email should be multipart anyway so that your message defaults to a text version when HTML is unacceptable. It’s not just image blocking that makes this a smart strategy, but other factors such as the growing popularity of email devices like the Blackberry that are text-only. You will find that having to produce a meaningful text version will also improve the effectiveness of the HTML. Some research even indicates that text ads deliver higher click-thrus. For guidelines on writing clear, compelling text please visit the Inbox Web site for archived issues of this newsletter - www.inboxmarketer.com

2. Get in the address book

One way you can disable image blocking is to have your recipients include your sender address in their address book. For example, the sender address for Inbox Marketer News is info@inboxmarketer.com. If you create an Inbox Marketer entry in your address book using this address in the email field our newsletter will be unmolested by most ISP and personal filters. To do this in Microsoft Outlook, for example, simply create the new entry in "Contacts".

To get your readers to do this for you, we recommend adding the following line to the bottom of your messages to be included with unsubscribe and privacy links:

To ensure consistent delivery of this publication, please add our sender address - info@inboxmarketer.com - to your address book.

3. Create a Web version of the message

Finally, you can host a version of your message on your Web site and provide a text link to it the email, perhaps right at the top. Regardless of image or personal settings, the recipient can always click through and view the message as a Web page.