Do you include any notes within the delivered copy about white space or other layout issues?
Thanks!
Scott

I deliver in html ready to go (or at least ready for a real html guy to use as a guide for how I want the page to look).

I used to deliver in word but man those "designers" really can screw up a sales funnel.

Yup html all the way.

It's just as easy for me as using word and there can be no mistakes on the customers end. Just copy, paste, profit!

Thank you both. Just text, no graphics I'm guessing?

I will often put their graphic in the letter too. When they're not yet available I have a set of placeholder graphics I use. Again... this is so I don't leave any placement... sizes... colors to designer chance.

Did I mention how quickly a designer will screw up a good letter?

I am not a designer, so my html copy would look pretty horrible and/or take me an inordinate amount of time. So I deliver my copy in a Word document with what are the equivalent of stage directions within square brackets. I tell the client that anything within brackets is meant as a comment or instruction, not to be on the page.

It's easy for them to follow, and no one has ever uttered a word of complaint about this arrangement.

Marcia... it's all about what works for us. IMO this specific action isn't about what's best for the client. A good salesperson can sell his or her preference on the client...

To me, thinking visually is just natural... so seeing and feeling the mood... the whole thing... works best for me.

My html coding is zero... I don't know how to do it at all. I use a wysiwyg program that writes the html for me. And according to designers it's pretty crappy code.

I let the client know this too. I tell them the page will look exactly how I want it to look... and it will load quickly enough and "work." But if they care about clean code, they should use it as a guide for their html person.

Sometimes clients approve it in word in sort of a layout on that document and then I do the layout in html. Sometimes I plan the navigation (menu-driven site) and then design the site and do the whole thing. The navigation is an outline and sometimes I add an jpg that illustrates how it might translate to a menu.

Other times I just send them a word doc with pretty tight layout direction to the designer. So it depends on who they have on staff and any number of issues. But I mostly write menu-driven sites and not as many sales letters. My clients don't always have a product but sometimes it's for relationship marketing or a service or corporation. And when I do get calls for sales letters, it's someone already very established who wants something very unorthodox to experiment and test the waters.

Vin, which software do you use for the purpose?

I use MS Frontpage because I feel it's easy to use it. At least easier than NVU and the other HTML editors.

But Frontpage tends to bloat the code and very often the page shows up differently in firefox and IE.

You know of any better wysiwyg editors?

I use Kompozer which is an updated version of NVU.

I haven't used frontpage in a long time. It not only does what you said... but there's also that whole "frontpage extension" situation with the client's server. Since I never know what his server will or will not have, I just stick with Kompozer... which is plenty easy.