To try and get this back on track, here is a bonus thought.
Subject lines
No more than 56 characters. You thought Twitter was restrictive, well think 84 characters *more* restrictive!
You need to get their attention quickly and achieve standout. Personalisation* is great for this. So adding variable_firstname is a winning tactic:
Hey, Damian, here's this week's update...
But, the important thing to remember is that you only get 56 characters. This isn't a law, but is Best Practise and will mean that it is very likely that your beautiful, hand-crafted subject line will not be truncated by the email client.
*yes, it has an s not a z, I am British
