If you’re sporting some technical know-how and feel comfortable with HTML, then you may consider embedding video in your emails. ( Read our guide to CSS animations in email here.)Ĭheck out Kristian’s blog post on creating the technique, and also this article from Litmus with an alternative way to use faux video to inspire recipients into “playing” the video. This takes an advanced level of CSS and HTML knowledge, but once you understand it can really enhance use of video in email. This is accomplished by combining image sprites (a comic strip of static images) with background-image and CSS keyframes to move the image. Create a faux video with CSS animation.įaux video, a term coined by Kristian Robinson, means to use CSS animation to make the effect of a video or GIF.Ī faux video shows one static image frame after another quickly to look like a moving image. And by ensuring the circle around the play button is full on the first frame, the image looks good on email clients that only support static images.Ĥ. Harley-Davidson used an animated GIF on their play button to call attention to it and compel subscribers to click through and play their video. This next example is a hybrid-it links a static image and an animated GIF. ![]() Pro tip: Add a play button overlay to your GIF to encourage subscribers to click through to your video. Just upload your video, choose where to start and end your GIF, and the tool will generate the file for you. One online tool you can use to convert a video file to a GIF for free is EZ GIF. If you need help creating a GIF, there are plenty of tools available. Here’s another example from Trelise Cooper. Click the image to see the animated GIF in action. Monica Vinader uses not just one GIF, but two, in this email campaign promoting the brand’s signature bangle. * Static image specifically for Outlook */ You can either create the GIF to show key information in the first frame, or, using the following snippet of code, show an alternative image to Outlook versions that don’t support GIFs: /* Gif to be shown on all clients */ ![]() But it’s worth noting that Outlook 2007, 2010, 2013, and Windows 10 do not support this image type-they only show the first frame of the GIF. GIFs are well-supported across email clients. Use a GIF of the video.Īnother easy way to give the illusion of video in email is to use the ever-popular, animated GIF. You can also make the video autoplay when someone clicks on it, eliminating the need for them to have to click again on the hosted version. If you want your video to play as soon as your subscriber clicks on the play button, simply add a ?play to the end of the video URL. Make sure adding the video into your campaign will entice people to engage in the way you need, and serve to increase your KPIs. If the email’s goal is to increase the views on your YouTube channel or to serve more ads on a story page, putting the whole video in the email will stop the user getting to that page. ![]() Then the full video content could live on your shop page, where the buy button is only a click away If the goal of your video is to encourage recipients to click through to your shop, it may be better to use a shorter GIF as a teaser to get them to click through. Your email is a way to connect your subscribers to something you’re doing: selling a product, hosting an event, sharing stories and news. You won’t want an epic thirty minute video streaming from your servers to a million subscribers all at once! The cost of hosting and streaming the video needs to be taken into account. With a rule of thumb that static images should try to be below 200KB, GIFs below 1MB, video needs to stay in this kind of range. That means hosting a video in your content distribution network (CDN) or on your company servers, then serving it to your email recipients. You need to send the video file in the email, same as you would a static image or GIF. Unlike a website, you can’t embed a video and stream it from YouTube or Vimeo. ![]() So how are the world’s best marketers taking advantage of video and making it work in email? First, start with your video.įirst of all, you need to have a video that can be shared in email. Video boosts click-through rates by 65%.In spite of that, 76% of marketers plan to increase their use of YouTube and video marketing, because video has an undeniable impact on email KPIs: It’s a progressive enhancement to include where possible, but it’s always best to check your subscriber list and see if a large enough portion of your audience would be able to see the video in email.Įmail clients like Gmail, Outlook, Thunderbird, and others often don’t support the technical requirements needed to play video right inside the email. Video doesn’t just instantly play if you include it. Video has more support within email than in the past, but it still doesn’t follow the web’s universal support.
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