After the annual August lull when most of the country seems to carve out at least one week to take a vacation, the soccer fields, hockey rinks, and other competitive venues are once again filled with grown adults reliving their adolescent athletic dreams. OK, our adolescent athletic dreams - I count myself among them. In fact, I expect a lot of email marketers suit up for competition on weekends. If you spend your weeks jostling for position and results in the inbox, it is only natural your competitive streak extends to extra-curricular events on Saturday and Sunday. The hardest part …

We tend to use the terms preference center and subscription center synonymously, yet in most cases they offer very different values to the consumer and the business. The belief is that the consumer understands enough about the brand they are engaging with that they will self-select options of communications, including cadence, type of communication and even communication channel. The belief is that the consumer will update this information somewhat regularly so it doesn't get outdated. I've always been a bit of a skeptic when it comes to the value of preference centers, but some of the social media polls and …

No surprises here: In its latest Mobile Email Opens Report, data management firm Knotice revealed that the share of mobile email opens continues growing by leaps and bounds, up 32% in the first half of 2012 compared to the second half of 2011. 36% of all email opens are now occurring on mobile devices (25% smartphones, 11% tablets), with the remaining 64% of email opens occurring on desktops. But something strange is brewing when you dig deeper into the numbers. According to Knotice's report, nearly four times as many emails are being opened on iPhones than on Android smartphones. Meanwhile, …

On Aug. 30, 1982, 16-year-old V.A. Shiva Ayyadurai was issued a copyright for a computer program he named "EMAIL." As "email" celebrates its 30th birthday, it continues to evolve in response to the increasing demands and expectations of consumers for personalized service. Marketing has become a 24/7 job, and email is an increasingly important part of that job. In fact, consider the following statistics that show how smart marketers are using email to fuel growth:

After releasing our 4th annual Email Design Look Book a few weeks ago, I was asked how the fourth edition was different from the first. It was a great question -- not only because there were quite a few differences, but also because those differences are in part a commentary on how our industry has become much more tech-driven, and how what constitutes email "design" has changed over the past four years. Having had more time to dwell on the question, here's how I'd answer it now:

With consumer adoption of smartphones continuing to grow at an unprecedented speed, by now most email marketers will agree that optimizing campaigns for mobile devices is a key priority. But what is the best way to do this? Here are pros and cons of the emerging approaches to mobile email optimization: prefab content, responsive design, and live content.

In this and past political seasons, one often-discussed topic is whether it's OK for a candidate to change his stance on an issue. If candidates change their opinion because their views and assumptions have truly changed and evolved over the years, then I would argue changing one's views is a positive sign. It can show a willingness to change and evolve as they learn more - through facts, real-world use cases and personal experiences. On the other hand, changing your stance simply to get more votes -- or because that's the way the wind is blowing -- is cowardly or …

I don't know that anyone cares for the process surrounding a request for proposal (RFP) or request for information (RFI). It is an expense in labor and brain power that, in my experience, rarely meets the original goal marketers set out to accomplish. There are in my opinion, four major reasons why a marketer would extend an RFP, with mistakes related to each:

Social channels provide marketers a wonderful virtual duck blind where they can actually see the reactions to their campaigns and use not just feedback, but direct interactions with their target market, to optimize their approach. Social channels will help you gauge what is relevant and effective and will allow subscribers and non-subscribing consumers to inspire you to create even more effective content.

It happens to the best of us (even A-list celebs): the dreaded wardrobe malfunction. You put something out there in the world that is best kept under wraps or to the confines of your private life. But, nonetheless, it is out there and needs to be dealt with. Some wardrobe malfunctions are bigger than others -- and the response will depend on just how egregious the offense happens to be. And to be clear, "oops!" isn't always the right answer.