Guidelines

Tips for creating an effective e-mailer

1. Aim for a compelling Subject Line

• A successful campaign starts with an effective subject line.They need to attract attention, just like the headlines.

• A decision to open an email solely depends on its subject lines.

• They are often personal or descriptive which gives the recipient a reason to check out your content.

• Length of a subject line is an important factor and hence it should not exceed more than 5-6 words.

 

2. Disseminate the right information

• An emailer should contain information that is precise, accurate and easy to understand. It should not leave the users in sheer ambiguity.

• Do not overwhelm the users with too much information.

• Write effective sub headings to draw the users to read full text.

 

3. Drive in engagement through a call to action button

• To encourage interaction with your emailer, the content should ask the readers to act.

• The call to action button should promote engagement with the content.

 

4. Focus on the language of the content

• While you create the content, you should always aim at writing in active voice.

• The language of content can be put up in the forms of questions which will invoke curiosity among the readers.

• The terminology and acronyms used should be familiar to the vast majority of the subscribers. (Eg; Ministry’s name)

 

5. Keep a count check on HTML links

• It’s important to keep the links to a bare minimum.

• If the body of your content is littered with too many links, your emailer might end up in the spam folder 
  
   

6. Maintain a standard emailer

• While selecting the fonts and colors, the top priority is legibility.

• Stick with basic fonts and logo based color schemes and refrain from using more than two fonts or colors.

• Maintain a constant design which will help in recognizing the brand

 

7. Retain the hierarchy

• Most readers will be scanning your emails or viewing them on a small screen. Put the most important information first.

 

8. Beauty is the bandwidth of the beholder

• While you design your emailer, always aim to make it visually appealing.

• Use pictures and graphics to compliment the information.

• Analyze the data of the previous campaigns to see what kind of images got the maximum clicks. Repeat them for the next 2-3 campaigns

 

9. Convey the brand value

• A header and footer gives the emailer a rounded feel and a sense of completeness.

• Readers who wish to connect with social media accounts and other micro sites; footer plays an essential role.

 

10. Test before sending the e-mailer

• View the e-mailer in different email clients, on different browsers and on different mobile devices.

• There are certain things that might go wrong hence check the images, links, content and the technical delivery.

 

Note

With increasing smart algorithms, automated mails are filtered out from the main inbox and often go to either spam or promotions. To avoid such risks, it is advisable to send plain texte-mailers or plain HTML emails which will directly land in the user’s primary folder(INBOX).