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Failing to Test an Email Newsletter

I’m an avid cyclist and belong to three clubs here in the Northwest. The Cascade Bicycle Club puts on the annual Seattle To Portland (STP) ride each year, an epic 205 mile endurance ride that I have signed up for in 2020. Today the club sent out an email newsletter, which is always a good way to communicate with the membership, and they asked me to take a survey, so I clicked the button to help provide feedback.

Clicking the link opened up a new tab in my web browser, so far, so good, but then I saw this warning:

So what happened?

Well, the person that designed the form forget to actually test out the email newsletter from a typical club member. The result will likely be that Zero people actually get to fill out the survey, which totally defeats the purpose.

Yes, your organization has to have in place a proper testing procedure to ensure that accidents like this don’t happen to an entire membership list. It’s quite likely that the club will respond to my email and fix the Google Form permission, opening up the survey to actual members, and that the club should re-send their email to:

  • Acknowledge the mistake
  • Fix the mistake
  • Ask for survey participation

I make mistakes almost every day, so when I learn from my mistake then progress is made.

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