Mike has just finished part 3 of “Coding an HTML Email in 3 Easy Steps” and has provided useful code suggestions, tips and a generic starting place for future email messages.

Here are some of Mike’s Key tips:

  • Place a doctype at the top of all emails to ensure code is following standards in Outlook and Express
  • Always enclose the email in an open and close HTML set of tags, this lowers spam score
  • No need for the head tag, and always ensure the style block is placed BELOW the body tag
  • The overall link style is used because some clients will rewrite links using their default font/color
  • The td alignment fix was used for issues in Hotmail live wherein a centered table would force all internal cells to be aligned center as well
  • A complete table, with an ID of cssshell to ensure the style block is used on this table only, if you use overriding styles with no ID attribute you run the risk of styling the entire interface of a webmail client

Do you have other coding tips you would like to share? Email them to contact or leave a comment.