The EU Commission has proposed making business-to-business (B2B) marketing via electronic channels permissible only with an opt-in consent. Under PECR email and SMS B2B marketing is opt-out. Under the new rules businesses would need a prior consent in order to contact other businesses with direct marketing communications. This is a major change.

With the arrival of the new legislation, double opt-in will become essential for businesses looking to continue their marketing after 2018. In order to sign up for communications, prospects will have to fill out a form or tick a box and then confirm it was their actions in a further email.

An unwritten rule that the image: text ratio must be 40:60 is something for everyone to follow if you wish to surpass the hassles of deliverability. If you wish to defy the rule for to make your email image more visually pleasing, you can choose to add a background image. Even if an ESP like Outlook blocks background images, there is a way to handle the issue.

To an email marketer, people who have not opened email represent a big chunk of their database. Email is without a doubt the one of the most effective digital marketing channels, although as few as 5% of people who engage are active buyers. It's also relatively fairly straightforward way to predict return on advertising spend, based on historical open and conversion rates.

Write a draft calendar for 2017 that includes the types of emails or promotions you want to run throughout the year -- whether it will be repeats of successful campaigns from 2016, new ideas, or even replicating what competitors have done. The point of the exercise is to physically write a plan on a calendar, as a high-level schedule. This plan will provide a basic roadmap.

Just like "one size doesn't fit all," everyone has a different taste. Thus segmentation comes into play. "Segmentation" in email marketing is like knowing the "exact measure" of what ingredients must go in a dish to make it totally lip-smacking! As per a MarketingSherpa Report, 32% of marketers aim to segment their email database in the coming years.

Email marketing has proven year after year to be an extremely important channel for retailers. Those who do it right enjoy not only more business, but both higher customer engagement and satisfaction levels. But how exactly is email marketing used by retailers, which areas are showing successes (and failures) and what can this sector learn from its peers?

Yahoo has said more than one billion user accounts may have been affected in a hacking attack dating back to 2013. The Internet giant said it appeared separate from a 2014 breach disclosed in September, when Yahoo revealed that 500 million accounts had been accessed. Yahoo said names, phone numbers, passwords and email addresses were stolen, but not bank and payment data.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny has told the Dail he uses a personal email account for official business. But he said that email address does not receive sensitive Government information. Kenny said he had a number of email accounts. But he said it would not be appropriate to transmit this correspondence on an official department email account.

A message that looks fine on a laptop might not on a phone. So test it out before you send anything to a busy or important person. "You always have to take into account that someone will be processing that message on-the-go, in an impatient state, at a glance," said Jocelyn Glei, author of Unsubscribe: How to Kill Email Anxiety, Avoid Distractions, and Get Real Work Done.