There are a few key points to ensure you have a successful email marketing design.  

 

 

The most important of these, is to keep it simple. If your email is flashy and attention-grabbing, but with no real content, you’re not going to get the results you want.  People can spot and steer clear of gimmicks, so if your current campaign is ‘gimmicky’ you may want to consider revamping it.  If you make the decision to revamp consider the following: 

 

Treat your subject line the same way as you would a headline in a sales letter. After all, that’s really what it is. To get your e-mails opened, your subject line has to follow the classic AIDA principle:

 

• grab Attention
• gain Interest
• create Desire
• generate Action (in this case, clicking through to read the content)

 

There are complete training courses available on how to write attention grabbing headlines, but just being aware of – and applying – the AIDA principle will put you head and shoulders above most email marketing designs.

 

Try a simple email newsletter. The reason for this is that in a recent report by Nielson Norman Group, the average e-mail user reviews an Internet newsletter for an average of 50 seconds, whereas an e-mail will only hold your reader’s attention for around four seconds. As you can see the newsletter format will hold your average readers attention 10 times longer than a normal email. This, in turn, brings us to the actual design of the newsletter or the e-mail…

 

It’s important to create a simple email marketing design that both captures and keeps the attention of your audience.  The simple truth is that most consumers and e-mail users only read a fraction of the e-mails they receive.  The rest of the e-mails that they actually open are merely scanned for content.  Depending upon the individual, different advertising dynamics are found appealing.  For this reason, your e-mail newsletter or advertisement should appeal to each of these demographics.

 

Aside from simplicity, an effective email marketing campaign will utilise a certain amount of colour.  By using contrasting font colours you can draw the eye of your readers to action points and amplify certain statements. 

 

When using colours, you may need to consider the e-mail standards for in-boxes. For example Hotmail and AOL both use different standards when it comes to opening e-mail, so it’s a good idea to use colours and fonts that will be visually appealing and acceptable in any e-mail genre.

 

There have been countless studies on how most Internet users read e-mails and documents on the web. Your e-mail marketing design should be able to gain your reader’s attention – fast!  The most effective design is based on a concept of “a five second view”.  This means that e-mail should be readable, or at least scan-able, within five seconds.

 

It’s a good idea to use your ensure that your message takes up less “real estate” than most e-mail messages or advertisements.  Try to avoid using graphics or photos, but if you really must have them, make sure they load rapidly. If your e-mail takes up too much space, or comes across as too “spammy”, most service providers will automatically filter it out as junk.

 

E-mail marketing is a rapid response industry.  This means you must be certain to give your potential clients every opportunity to make contact with you.  You can be easily contacted via contact information placed within your messages.  Be sure to include links to your site, your address information, your phone numbers, your fax number and any other information that can be used to contact you on a daily basis, in every e-mail that you send to potential clients.

 

Let’s face it! Without proper email marketing design your email campaign may inevitably fail. Use what you have learned here and your email campaign will stand a much better chance of adding profit to your bottom line.