Contact
If you have any additional questions, our support team is ready to assist.
Holly O’Hara / Account Director
holly.ohara@thebridgecorp.com
Introduction
BRIDGE’s email creative testing process is designed to be efficient and streamlined to improve the overall experience for our clients. Below you will find everything you need to be successful with your email creatives.
Your email tests will be automated to improve turnaround times and ensure a high-quality customer experience. Creative previews will now be sent alongside all of your tests using EOA (Email on Acid), a third-party tool that creates email previews across the most popular email clients and devices.
NEW STANDARD FORMATS
- Use of standard BRIDGE macros for Personalization
- BRIDGE macros and codes for Unsubscribe, View in Browser and Pre-Header
- Naming your email creative in a specific format
- Creating & saving the test and live seed lists following a specific file format and file type
Your Campaign Checklist
Email creative must be an HTML file or a zip file and must follow these naming conventions in lowercase:
“content_yourtexthere” for HTML files and “creative_content_yourtexthere” for zip files.
Important Note:
Zipped folders must contain only one HTML file and your creative assets. You may see additional files in your zip folder if your artwork was created on a Mac. Remove this folder prior to upload.
Subject Line, From Line
Both the test and live seed list in the correct file format
Unsub Address, View In Browser (if needed), Pre-header (if needed)
Customization
Macros
Unsubscribe
View in Browser
Pre-Header
Fix
Macros
Macros
BRIDGE macros were designed to help standardize format requirements for personalization. Code your email creatives with the macros attached below to incorporate personalized fields that auto-populate based on each recipient’s corresponding information.
Personalization Macros
PII data includes email address, first name, last name, address, phone, cookie, MAID, IP Address, or anything else related to a person’s location.
If your creative has personalization, the BRIDGE macros must be coded within the email creative. Ask yourself the following questions:
- What are the areas of personalization?
- Have you coordinated the data fields being pulled with the required BRIDGE macros? For example, if there is a first name macro within the creative, your creative should be coded with {{FirstName}}
- Are there any personalized URLs within the creative? If so, you would use the macro {{URL}}
Note: Personal Identifiable Information (PII) cannot be exposed in URLs — if there is ever an instance where this is included in the coding, you will be required to replace it with a hash, md5, etc. BRIDGE will work with you on PII replacement options.
BRIDGE cannot support any level of PII within a destination URL in an HTML code. The most common and sensitive way to breach PII protocol is the insertion of an email macro inside of the URL. The action directly exposed a recipient’s email address with the client regardless of accepting any privacy policy. Please note, in replacement of an email macro you are able to use the following email encryption macros:
{{SHA1EMAIL}}
{{MD5EMAIL}}
If your HTML includes any of these types of link personalization, please make sure to communicate that to your designated Account Team as the audience file and seed lists will need to be formatted accordingly.
Custom Macros
Our custom macros allow you to have up to 25 different custom fields. As long as the email creative is coded with our {{CUSTOM}} macro, it will pull be able to pull the corresponding inputs.
Example: If your email creative includes a coupon code, and your client wants a unique code to be sent to each individual, you would use the {{CUSTOM1}} macro.
John Smith → Coupon Code: 1234
Sarah Marshall → Coupon Code: 1235
George Johnson → Coupon Code: 1236
If there are additional custom fields in the same creative, you would simply label them subsequently as 2,3,4, etc. depending on the number of custom fields.
Unsubscribe
Unsubscribe
Please open up the HTML in NOTEPAD++, scroll to the bottom of the file and insert the code directly above the tag.
Unsubscribe Address, Language, and Link
A physical mailing address, opt-out language, and a functional link must be included in your creative upon submission to BRIDGE. This is required for all BRIDGE creatives in order to comply with CAN-SPAM regulations.
For more information, visit: CAN-SPAM Act Compliance Guide
Consent (How it Works): Bridge logs unsubscribes at the advertiser level. If an email recipient chooses to unsubscribe, BRIDGE immediately confirms the unsub consent at the advertiser level, and they are removed from all future correspondence. Bridge keeps a record of all opt-outs tied to an individual record and uses a series of algorithms to identify records that frequently unsubscribe from our email campaigns. This information is applied and updated within our database in real-time.
Physical mailing address: Your message must include your valid physical postal address. This can be your current street address, a post office box you’ve registered with the U.S. Postal Service, or a private mailbox you’ve registered with a commercial mail receiving agency established under Postal Service regulations. If your advertiser does not have a physical mailing address, BRIDGE will provide one for you.
If your advertiser does not have a physical mailing address, BRIDGE will provide one for you.
Opt-out Language: Your message must include a clear and concise explanation of how the recipient can opt-out of getting email from you in the future. Craft the notice in a way that’s easy for an ordinary person to recognize, read, and understand.
If your advertiser does not have opt-out language, you can use one of the following options:
- If you would prefer not to receive such messages in the future, you may unsubscribe from our email list by clicking here.
- Click Here to Unsubscribe.
Functional Link: Advertiser’s Unsubscribe Link: If your advertiser includes their own opt-out link, Bridge will wrap the link and track these opt-outs across our own system as well.
BRIDGE Unsubscribe Link: BRIDGE’s opt-out link is now one of our standard macros. When used, it will code within your creative to automatically link to the Bridge opt-out page. This keeps track of the unsubscribes for you.
View in Browser
Below, we’ve provided instructions on how to code for View in Browser. Check out our instructions on how to incorporate these standard macros.
View in Browser
The ‘View in Browser’ link points to the web-hosted version of your email. This helps recipients who either can’t view the HTML emails, or have image downloading switched off, to view the full version of your email.
If you would like to have ‘View in Browser’ added to your email creative, you will need to add the ‘View in Browser’ macro insertion to the top of the email creative as follows: {{BROWSERVIEWLINK}}
Pre-Header
Below, we’ve provided instructions on how to code for Pre-header. Check out our instructions on how to incorporate these standard macros.
Pre-Header
A pre-header or preview text is a brief description of what’s in your email, shown as a preview in most inboxes next to the subject line. If you would like to insert a pre-header (preview text) into their HTML creative, there are two questions that should always be asked:
- What is the pre-header (preview text) you would like to insert? Do you want to input the subject line, or have a different pre-header?
- Do you need the pre-header (preview text) to be hidden or visible when the recipient opens the email? A Visible pre-header is visible within the body of an html, while a hidden one would only be visible within a recipients inbox and then be hidden in the body upon opening the email.
VISIBLE PRE-HEADER
On the right-hand side of the image below, the pre-header (preview text) is visible within the body of the HTML.
HIDDEN PRE-HEADER
On the right-hand side of the image below, the pre-header (preview text) is hidden within the body of the HTML
Fix
What is it? Not to be confused with a pre-header…
A subject line prefix is used for multi-segment campaigns, particularly those that do not have distinctive creative or subject line differentiation. If you wish to include a keyword differentiator within the subject line to differentiate between multiple email tests within your campaign, please provide that detail to your designated account manager. Pre-fixes are used for testing purposes, but are automatically removed for live seeds and deployment.
Consider an email campaign with 50 segments, one for each U.S state. Each creative requires a different disclaimer to be placed in the footer based on different state regulations and you’d like to see a version of each creative be tested prior to deploying the email. Find an example below:
Example Advertiser: L’Oreal Makeup
Subject Line: L’Oreal Makeup at Your Local CVS!
# of Segments: 50 segments per state (one per U.S state)
Prefix: NJ Market
Output of the Subject line in the Test: (Test NJ Market) L’Oreal Makeup at Your Local CVS!
Formatting Your Creative Files
Your creative must be one of the two options below:
- Hosted Email Creative: Fully coded HTML or TXT w/ images hosted by you, your client or a 3rd party
- Non-Hosted Email Creative: Zip file with HTML and all associated images
Saving a hosted HTML
If your email creative has hosted images (a fully coded and hosted HTML), the creative naming convention should follow: content_xxxx.html
Example: content_JoesPlumbing.html
NOTE: Be sure that html is saved in lowercase letters.
To save this file, simply save your code as an .html or save the pure html code in a notepad document (all other formats will alter the code)
Saving a non-hosted HTML
If your creative requires image hosting, the zip file naming convention must follow: creative_content_xxxx.zip
Example: creative_content_JoesPlumbing
NOTE: The images can be posted within the zip folder along with the HTML, or within a different folder within the zip folder, but you CANNOT have a zip folder within a zip folder.
To save this file:
- Locate the file or folder that you want to compress.
- Right-click the file or folder, select (or point to) Send to, and then select Compressed (zipped) folder.
- A new zipped file or folder with the same name is created in the same
Creating, Naming and Saving Seed Lists
What is a test list?
A test list is a list of recipients who receive the testing of your email creatives to review content, rendering and link functionality. The tests are then utilized to approve creative design. You can have multiple rounds of test lists to ensure quality assurance.
What is a live seed list?
A live seed list is a list of recipients to include alongside your live deployment schedule. These recipients will receive a live email creative to notify that their deployment has started.
Create
Name
Save
Create
Creating Seedlists
If your creative does not have personalization, you will only need an email header and one column within your file.
- Open a new blank workbook in excel
- In Row 1, enter ‘Email’ as your column header
If your creative does have personalization, your headers will need to match the required BRIDGE Macros. These fields will get pulled into the creative and will be included in both your testing and live seed lists.
- Open a new blank workbook in excel
- In Row 1, enter ‘Email’ as your first column header
- In Row 2, input the additional column headers that match the areas of personalization within your email creative.
- No spaces before, in between, or after the inputs
- For example, if your creative includes ‘First name’ personalization, you would need to include an additional header labeled with the corresponding BRIDGE macro. In this case, it would be: FIRSTNAME
- Dynamic content will appear exactly as it is input into the lists.
- For example, if you input first name ‘JOHN’ (all caps) and last name, ‘Smith’ under the FIRSTNAME and LASTNAME macro headers, it will appear as ‘JOHN Smith’ in the creative.
- No spaces before, in between, or after the inputs
- Any other custom macros would be included as additional columns labeled with the header ‘CUSTOM’. You would add 1,2,3,4, etc. depending on the # of custom macros included in the creative.
- For example, CUSTOM1, CUSTOM2, CUSTOM3
- These custom fields would be pulled into the email creative, based on where the macro has been coded.
- For example, CUSTOM1, CUSTOM2, CUSTOM3
Name
Naming Seedlists
Your files must following the following naming conventions.
Test list naming convention follows: test_r#_xxxx
- xxxx= creative name
- e.g. test_r1_JoesPlumbing
- Live seed list naming convention follows: live_xxxx
- xxxx=creative name
- e.g. live_JoesPlumbing
If there are multiple rounds of testing, you will follow the same naming convention as above BUT make sure each round is noted in the file name.
- e.g. If 3 rounds of testing are required, the test lists should follow the naming conventions:
test_r1_bridgemarketing, test_r2_bridgemarketing, test_r3_bridgemarketing
Save
Saving Seedlists
Both your test and live seed list should be saved in CSV (comma delimited) format
- In the upper left-hand corner click File, Save As
- Enter a file name, you MUST use the naming conventions below
- For Save as Type, select CSV (Comma delimited)
- In the upper left-hand corner click File, Save As
- Enter a file name, you MUST use the naming conventions below
- For Save as Type, select CSV (Comma delimited)
FAQs
Our system is designed to work with the most simple and standard types of macros. We wanted the user experience to be as easy as possible, and consistent across all of our valued partners.
BRIDGE used a variety of the recommended previews in the links below, as well as what we deem to be the industry’s more commonly requested and used screens and devices.
https://emailclientmarketshare.com/
https://litmus.com/blog/the-2017-email-client-market-share-infographic
If you need to see additional previews of email clients, please indicate which ones are needed and we will do our best to accommodate.
Our team will work closely with your in-house or third-party creative team to fully integrate the BRIDGE macros into your production processes. We will offer a series of trainings and information sessions around CCM and are available at any time for hands-on coaching and to follow up on any questions about this new process.
The HTMLs need to be properly coded with the BRIDGE macros in order for this system to work efficiently. By sending HTML over to us following these new requirements, we can guarantee that your creative is tested much faster.