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The video below demonstrates this, but here is a summary of the key benefits of this additional editing option:

• Editable Regions – certain areas of the template can be restricted so they cannot be changed, helping you maintain brand guidelines and ensure code is not broken.

• Content Library – populate the Content Snippets Library in Maxemail with content and then this is all available to insert into your email with a couple of clicks. You can even integrate your existing website or product databases, so every product or holiday you offer is available as an item for you to drop in. This dramatically reduces the build time on an email.

• Drag and Drop Interface – move content around with point and click, rather than the unreliable method of copying and pasting.

However not without a significant issue for email marketers.

One of the first things we have noticed is the alignment of your email and some background colours are missing when using a user reads your email in Firefox, Chrome, Safari or any other browser which is not IE.

This is nearly 70% of Internet users according to w3schools.com

Here is an old versus new Hotmail example on an email:

Old version of Hotmail:

New version of Hotmail:

As you can see it looks like the email is now left aligned and the grey background has gone. What has actually happened is Hotmail will only display your email as wide as the maximum defined width in pixels – either from a table width in pixels or the width of the widest image – whichever is wider.

So if you have a containing table used to help set alignment and background colours at a width of 100% it won’t work. If your inner table which is set to a fixed width rather than a percentage of say 600 pixels then that is the width your entire email will be shown as.

So the background colour and alignment is as we defined but your 100% width table will only be 600 pixels wide and therefore none of it will be shown.

Why does it do this?

Essentially Hotmail has some code on the page which will always render the width of the email as the maximum fixed width you defined.

How do I fix it?

You could force the containing table to be say 900 pixels – but those viewing it in low screen resolutions or only a partial screen will not be able to see your full email. Indeed Hotmail even prevents you from scrolling to see these parts.

What you need to do is tell Hotmail to change it’s code and you can do that with a CSS reference. The items that restrict the width are much further up the page.

Simply put this CSS within your email and this will fix the issue:

<STYLE type=”text/css”>
.ReadMsgBody
{ width: 100%;}
.ExternalClass
{width: 100%;}
</STYLE>

This tells your browser to change the code that Hotmail uses to restrict your email width.
And to prove it works here is the email with the fix:

New version of Hotmail (Email Fixed):

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This video was made to help you decide which html editor is best for you in relation to creating content for your email marketing messages.

We summarise the pros and cons of:

• Dreamweaver
• Contribute
• KompoZer

A number of top tips for email marketers during the Christmas period. For more Christmas email tips download our whitepaper.