We all make mistakes.
But here at BSD, we do everything we can to prevent that [facepalm] moment after you’ve just sent an email to 1.2 million pro-choice activists with the greeting, “Dear nature lover.”
We like to think we’re flawless, but as mere mortals, we need systems in place to keep the details from slipping through the cracks.
Our Communications team has spent years perfecting our email quality assurance (QA) system. We call it “checklisting,” and we do it for every single email we execute for our clients. (And what kind of teaching agency would we be if we didn’t share it with you? You can download it here.)
During the busy year-end fundraising season, the stakes are high and so is the volume: in December, our communications team will take on more than 500 checklists.
But no email is exempt, whether it’s a simple thank you to donors, a monthly newsletter, or a rapid response campaign.
So here are our tips for maintaining a flawless email program of your own:
1. Set up good habits.
Keep your copy as polished and copy-pastable as you can, even before getting the necessary approvals. Avoid placeholders whenever possible. If there are quirks in your email system, such as personalization tags always needing to be %UPPERCASE%, whenever you’re drafting an email, always spell out those tags in %UPPERCASE%. This will save you time and panic later, trust us.
2. Finalize all assets BEFORE you load the email into your mailer.
Many organizations have a long approval pipeline (you’re not alone). Whether you need to pass the copy and graphics through two, three, four, or more different departments, make sure you do it all before the email gets anywhere near your mailer. Set up a standard sequence of reviews where the person with the most veto power receives it last. Follow this order of approvals every time. Make sure everyone knows where they sit within that order, and what kind of feedback is expected from them, to avoid overlapping edits and general chaos.
The quickest path to a typo or broken link is a last-minute change to an email after it’s already been loaded and ready to go. Enforce the “no changes” rule as firmly as you possibly can with all reviewers and approvers. It’s better to leave a less poetic (but accurate) phrase in an email than to introduce serious errors after a rushed edit two minutes before launch.
3. While we’re at it… stop using Word.
The Cloud exists for a reason. While fine for drafting formal memos, Word documents are a hazard when a draft is going through multiple revisions and tracked changes. This may seem 101, but take advantage of free services like Google Docs, where every member of the team can access and edit the same document, suggest changes, make comments, and even view the revision history. No more wondering whether you have the right version, or whether everyone’s comments have been incorporated — it’s all there in one central place. Just make sure to proofread the final product before loading your message.
4. Get fresh eyes on it.
If your team is large enough, assign QA to someone who had nothing to do with (or the least to do with) the creation of the email. This way, they’ll not only be able to identify typos and grammatical errors more easily, they’ll see the email as most of your recipients will: with little-to-no context. They’ll be able to tell you whether the landing page you built doesn’t allow you to complete an action, or if something just doesn’t make any sense. Valuable stuff.
5. Create your very own checklist.
So you’ve found a fresh pair of eyes for your email, but what are they looking for? Invest some time in creating a checklist that serves the special needs of your organization, and have your QA-ers follow it every time. This keeps everyone accountable, and brings a sense of calm to the process. If you need help building that checklist, we’ve created a template to get you started.
There you have it! Five tweaks you can make to your team’s processes to take a little bit of anxiety out of hitting the irreversible “SEND” button.