Designing compelling emails requires you to repeatedly put yourself in the shoes of the recipients of your email. You have to ask yourself, “What would make me want to open an email from company X and continue reading it if I was someone on my mailing list”?
Tips for Writing Effective Emails
This blog will guide you in this pursuit. Here are the 7 essential steps to design attractive corporate emails:
1. Write eye-catching subject lines
The subject line of your email is the first thing anyone sees when you send them an email. They inform the recipients about the topic of your email.
Writing intriguing subject lines is important. People will open and read your email only if the subject line sparks their interest. Here are some examples of good subject lines:
- FINAL HOURS! Get an EXTRA 15% off markdowns!
- A/W 2023: New drop.
- A Sneak Peek for VIPs Only.
- The timer’s going off on your cart!
People get tons of emails in their inbox every day; it is easy for your email to get lost in the clutter.
In this scenario, ensure your email’s subject line tells them what your email is about and why they should read it promptly.
2. Include concise preheaders
Preheader or preview text refers to the snippet of text that comes right after your subject line. It is another chance for you to convince the recipients to open your email by giving them a gist of the email’s content.
It might be difficult to estimate how much of your email preheader will be visible in the inboxes of the recipients. It depends on the email client itself, the device the recipient is using, and the length of the email’s subject line. For this reason, the text of the preheader should not exceed 130 characters, and the most important message should be placed at the very beginning.
3. Stay on-brand
Design your emails in a way that the recipients can recognize them as yours even before they start to read them.
To keep your emails on-brand, you should remember to:
- Use a voice and tone that is consistent with your other content or marketing materials (e.g., your website and social media)
- Make use of the same colors and fonts that you use in your other branding materials
- Include your logo, a link to your website, and links to your social media accounts
- Include Calls-To-Action (CTAs) that are relevant to your products or services.
With PosterMyWall, you can do all this and design professional-looking emails by customizing their corporate email templates.
4. Keep them short and sweet
People have busy schedules and short attention spans. Your emails should give them valuable information without being lengthy and tedious.
Since you do not know how long people will read your email, start off with your most important message. This will grab their attention and might make them read the entire email.
5. Ensure accessibility for all
To ensure everyone can read your emails, it is essential to make them accessible by optimizing their readability and design. Here are some tips to achieve this:
- Add ALT text to your images. This way people using screen readers will be able to understand the content better.
- Be careful about the contrast ratio of your images and colors. For example, white text over a yellow background may be hard to read.
- Ensure that your content is readable. Use a reasonable font size (typically 14-16 px) with decent line spacing, and provide enough whitespace between different sections.
- Use simple and inclusive language. Avoid unnecessary use of jargon and complex words.
- Make your emails mobile-friendly, as many recipients are likely to open and read your email on their phone.
6. Conduct A/B testing
With A/B testing, you can experiment with different email designs to determine which resonates better with your audience.
Create two versions (A and B) of the same email, that differ based on elements such as CTA buttons, images, or subject lines, and send them to two different samples of your mailing list. The version that yields more engagement (higher open rates or better click-through rates) from the recipients, is the one you should send to the rest of the people on your mailing list.
7. Optimize the email footers
End your emails with footers that are informative and leave a positive impression on the recipients. Effective email footers include:
- Your email signature.
- Contact information such as phone/mobile number and email address.
- Social media linked to your company’s accounts.
- Legal/privacy note.
- A link to unsubscribe from your emails. This will help you gain the trust of the recipients by showing them that you respect their choice to stop receiving emails from your company.
Conclusion
To grab the attention of and efficiently convey your message to the recipients of your emails, you have to be mindful of how they interact with emails in general. Following the steps mentioned in this blog will enable you to design engaging emails for your mailing list.
