Channel_e FAQs

MCH Channel_e Email FAQs

Does an email campaign replace a print campaign?

No, in the direct marketing world, reaching out to your customers and prospects as often as possible is the goal. Emails are cost effective and can be used to supplement a print campaign—before, after, or both—to boost response rates of print campaign. At MCH we call this the one-two punch.

What is the most important element in an email campaign?

Relevancy. Your offer has to be legitimate and relevant to the group you are targeting. Your subject line has to be forthright and provide a reasonable idea of the email’s topic—anything less than that can be considered fraudulent.

Why is “above the fold” or “above the scroll” important?

Many end users view email with the Preview Pane function enabled. The most important elements of your message should be viewable in the preview pane.

Why is branding important?

If you are fortunate enough to have a recognizable product or brand name, the open rate for your email campaign will increase. People tend to open emails from people or organizations they trust.

Can I use images in my email campaign?

Yes, the HTML version of your email can contain images. If there is a balance between images and text in your message, it will increase the deliverability rate. Be aware, however, that many ISPs block images. Therefore, it’s important that your message is clear when viewed without the images. It’s a mistake to send an email that contains all of its information in an image; it’s much more likely to end up in a “junk” folder.

Are there different reasons an email can’t be delivered?

Yes. In email marketing, a hard bounce means that the email inbox no longer exists. A soft bounce means that the ISP is temporarily unable to deliver an email. A soft bounce could occur when the recipient’s inbox is full. A blocked email means the ISP is refusing to accept email from a specific sender.

Can I use uppercase letters to call attention to a special point?

Yes, but use caution. Uppercase type can make the reader feel as if you are yelling at him. Also, too much uppercase type can trigger spam filters.

Are there particular words that can trigger spam filters?

Yes, words like Free, Hello, Call Now, and No Fee often raise a red flag, especially when used in the subject line.

Why should I ask my customers to add our email to their address book?

When someone adds you to his or her address book, you are considered a safe sender and the person is agreeing to receive promotional emails from you. This will allow your future messages to go the recipient’s inbox rather than being sent to a “junk” folder.

Does MCH use a spam filter testing resource?

Yes, MCH will send your email through a spam filtering application to test its deliverability. You will be able to adjust your message and/or content based on the results of the test.

Where can I find information about the CAN-SPAM Act?

You can find information about the CAN-SPAM Act at

What are the rules governing opt-out requests?

Companies must stop sending emails to the requestor’s email address within 10 business days. You must continue to process opt-out requests for 30 days after you send your commercial email. MCH immediately captures opt-out requests from your deployment and suppresses them from future campaigns.

Can I re-email to an address that has previously opted out?

The simple answer is “No.” Under the CAN-SPAM regulations, you must honor all opt-out messages, regardless of the service provider used to deploy an email campaign. Once an opt-out—always an opt-out.

Why is it important to include my name and my company’s address?

Including your organization’s postal address in your email is a requirement under the CAN-SPAM Act. Including a personal name or signature block increases the chances of your message getting through a spam filter.

What is a permission pass email?

A permission pass email is an email sent to recipients to confirm that they want to receive your offers. For opt-in, only those who respond and confirm are kept on the subscribed list. Recipients who do not answer or whose addresses bounce are considered to have opted-out and are deleted from the list. For opt-out, messages are sent to the recipients notifying them that a marketer intends to send them future commercial messages. Any recipients who opt-out are then removed from the list and the remainder are retained.

What are test addresses?

Just like using a seed address to monitor your print campaigns, you should have several test email accounts to test deliverability. Providers such as Yahoo and Gmail are free and allow you to have more than one email address. In addition to ensuring deliverability, these test addresses allow you to see what your message looks like when rendered by the various email viewers.

We provided both HTML and text versions of our email message. Will a recipient receive both versions?

During the proofing process, a recipient on the proof list of email addresses will receive both versions. That’s because the HTML and the text versions are sent as separate messages.During the actual deployment, both the HTML and text are sent together in a single multipart message. When a recipient’s email software receives a multipart message, it accepts the HTML version if it can render the HTML. Otherwise, the email software will present the plain text version to the user.

What is throttling, and why is it used during a deployment?

Throttling is a technique for spreading out an email deployment over a few hours, instead of sending the email messages as fast as possible. It is used to avoid overwhelming email servers that might be receiving many messages from the same deployment. Throttling is also used to increase deliverability, because some email servers will block messages from the sending server when many messages are received within a few minutes.

Why did our seed email addresses receive the message a few hours after the scheduled start time for the actual deployment?

Seed email addresses are added to the bottom of the email address list. Therefore, the last few messages sent are those going to the seed addresses. Deployment of a long list of email addresses, especially when throttled, can cause a noticeable delay between the start of the deployment and the receipt of messages by the seed email addresses.

What is your standard turnaround time?

If the order and all email message assets are received by 10:00 AM CST:

  • The proof will deploy the next business day after 5:00 PM.
  • The email will deploy within 24 hours of your approval of the proof.

If the order and all email message assets are received by 3:00 PM CST:

  • The proof will deploy after noon on the 2nd business day.

Requests for earlier proof deployments will be considered a Rush Order and will be subject to a $100 fee. Rush Orders will be entered in the system only after approval by the MCH Email Processing Team.

What is your typical deliverability rate, open rate, or click thru rate on emails?

The results of an email campaign can vary by so many factors that it is difficult to generalize results. Your results will depend on your offer, subject line, deployment timing, and many other variables. Here are some broad ranges that have been typical for marketers using MCH’s Channel_e services.

  • Deliverability Rate: MCH email deployments typically have deliverability rates of 84%-94%, except for the education market between June and September, when deliverability rates trend about 10% lower due to the change in school staff. Please keep in mind that MCH never charges you for undelivered messages. Because every deployment has some amount of bounced messages, your invoiced amount will be less than your quoted amount, except for minimum orders.
  • Open Rate: The typical open rates for our clients’ emails have been 6% – 12% of messages delivered. Some campaigns have been above 20% and others have had as few as 2% opened messages. The open rate of your message is highly dependent on the subject line of your message, the brand awareness of your company, targeting the appropriate audience, and timing.
  • Click Thru Rate: The click thru rate of opened messages varies widely, with rates of 5% – 25% being typical. Some messages have exceeded 60% and others have had less than 1%. The click thru rate for your campaign is almost entirely dependent on the strength of your offer and creative materials.