• by Jess Nelson , September 20, 2017

Interactive emails are now compatible with the Gmail App on Android phones, thanks to a new technique released Wednesday by Email on Acid. 

The Colorado-based email testing provider unveiled its “Filmstrip Interactive Email Technique” in a blog post online. 

Interactive emails have higher engagement rates than traditional text-based email messages, but this type of responsive design has largely been sequestered to iOS devices. Kinetic emails increase unique clicks by 18.3% and click-to-open rates by more than 10%, according to Experian’s’ Q4 2016 Email Benchmark Report, but interactive email has not been supported in the Gmail email application that comes bundled on Android devices.

“Until now interactive email is mostly limited to the iPhone, so finally folks on the other side will be able to experience multimedia storytelling in their inbox,” says Justin Khoo, senior email developer at Email on Acid. "Seeing that Android has a larger market share than iOS, we think this has the chance to bring interactive email to the mainstream."

Khoo says Email on Acid is calling the new technique "Flimstrip" because it allows a designer to develop the multiple states of interactive content as a series of frames like a filmstrip, and that it is much easier to use than existing techniques used to build interactive emai. "Clicking on a link simply displays the content of one frame to the next. This technique makes it easy for anyone new to interactive email to code since they can build the email using the techniques that they're already familiar with."

Email Marketing Daily received a test message utilizing Email on Acid’s new frame-by-frame technique. The email contained an in-message photo of a snail mail envelope with the author’s name. When clicked, the envelope opened to contain a letter with salutations.