Linking to email address

Options
Meredith Riddick
Meredith Riddick
Eighth Anniversary First Comment
in Blackbaud Luminate Online® & Blackbaud TeamRaiser® Discussions
Are you able to add a clickable link to an email address in the body of an email? If so, will someone please explain how?


Thanks!
Tagged:

Comments

  • Brian Mucha
    Brian Mucha
    Ancient Membership 2500 Comments 250 Likes Name Dropper
    <a href="mailto:someone@domain.org">Someone</a>

    https://css-tricks.com/snippets/html/mailto-links/


    Not every client understands all the possible params, but I think the basics like above works pretty much everywhere.


    EDIT: Any params not supported are just ignored. So adding "?subject=My Feedback" won't break anything, but it may not actually set the subject in some email clients.


    EDIT TWO: I was also going to add that the user needs to have a mail client installed. If they are solely a webmail user then a mailto link won't work.


    And then I stumbled on this. It's five years old, so I'm not sure how accurate it still is. https://www.campaignmonitor.com/blog/email-marketing/2013/06/tip-avoid-using-mailto-links-in-html-email/


    BPM
  • Grace Rose Khalsa
    Grace Rose Khalsa
    Ninth Anniversary 10 Comments 25 Likes Photogenic

    Brian Mucha:

    <a href="mailto:someone@domain.org">Someone</a>

    https://css-tricks.com/snippets/html/mailto-links/


    Not every client understands all the possible params, but I think the basics like above works pretty much everywhere.


    EDIT: Any params not supported are just ignored. So adding "?subject=My Feedback" won't break anything, but it may not actually set the subject in some email clients.


    EDIT TWO: I was also going to add that the user needs to have a mail client installed. If they are solely a webmail user then a mailto link won't work.


    And then I stumbled on this. It's five years old, so I'm not sure how accurate it still is. https://www.campaignmonitor.com/blog/email-marketing/2013/06/tip-avoid-using-mailto-links-in-html-email/


    BPM

    I had never heard a maxim not to include mailto: links in emails! and, we put one in almost every email we send, but it's spelled out who you're emailing: "For more information or special accommodations, contact Susie at susieu@cjp.org." for example. (not a real person/email, btw!) So, does this primarily apply if you're hiding the actual email behind a phrase, as mentioned in the Campaign Monitor article?

  • Brian Mucha
    Brian Mucha
    Ancient Membership 2500 Comments 250 Likes Name Dropper
    That article says showing the email address as the link text makes no difference. Makes sense, the worry is that email clients (and users) aren't smart enough to detect this:


    Send personal info to: <a href="mailto:phishing@badguys.com">totallysafe@yourpal.org</a>


    Same concerns exist with link shorteners like Bitly. You can't really see what's there until you click. 


    Unless others chime in, I'm guessing it's just an old article. I don't see any other articles with similar warnings. I bet if many of our recipients were seeing a 'Blocked for your safety' we would have heard about it.


    BPM

Categories