Online marketers have a number of considerations to make prior to deciding to embed Flash animations in their email campaigns says a new white paper titled "The Perils & Promise Of Flash Email Marketing Campaigns In China", issued by XZList, the leading email mailing list management service in China.
One of the first ideas would-be Internet marketers in China cling to is that the use of Flash in their email campaigns will bring them increased clickthroughs, better brand recognition, and heightened consumer interaction. But according to XZList's recent study and white paper, using Flash in email campaigns should only be used in email campaigns targeted at users utilizing specific email services.
Whereas many marketers outside of China already shun Flash-based emails, Web-based email in China is different than popular Web-based email services in the rest of the world. This means marketers in China need not fear Flash-based email as much as outside of the country. While Yahoo, Gmail and Hotmail can not display Flash within their emails, Chinese email services like 163.com, Sohu.com, 21cn.com, and Sina.com do provide Web-based email services that can display Flash messages. This comes as a surprise to many email marketers working outside of China who often assume that Chinese Web-based providers would also block Flash-embedded emails.
Danny Levinson, CEO of XZList and author of the white paper, says, "Online marketers have many choices when trying to hit their correct online demographic. With the rise of Internet video and podcasting, some marketers are looking at embedding these videos as Flash animations and videos within their email campaigns. Though marketers have more opportunities to target Flash-based videos within China than outside, there are still many pitfalls that must be avoided."
The eight-page white paper is available as a free download from XZList's website. It is available either as an English-language download or a Chinese-language download. You can download the English from here: http://www.xzlist.com/images/xzlist-white-paper-using-flash-email-in-china.pdf