Through its unique design and content, an e-newsletter needs to capture the attention of potential readers and interest. Amongst an inbox full of emails your e-newsletter needs to stand out and people need to feel it is worthy of their time to open and read.
If you’re thinking of creating an e-newsletter for your business or if you’re existing newsletter needs some revamping, here are my top 5 tips to make sure your newsletter gets read:
1. Create Relevant Subject Lines
Most people go through their inbox at least once a day to remove irrelevant email. Today we are time poor so with too many emails and too little time it’s critical for your emails to have a subject line that is going to capture people’s attention and make them want to read more. People are looking for an excuse to delete your newsletter – don’t give them one! Don’t use a subject line like “Our January Newsletter. Or “What’s on in January”, instead, use something that grabs attention like an interesting topic or headline from the newsletter, such as “Bootcamp is alive in 2015” or “Membership packages now on Sale – be quick”.
Don’t make your subject lines too long, and don’t use acronyms in an effort to make them shorter, this is a sure-fire way to get your email deleted!
2. Use HTML with Text Backup
While text-only newsletters were quite common a few years ago, times have changed, and most people prefer to receive their newsletters in HTML. However it’s still a good idea to have a text version as back up for the handful of recipients that cannot read email in HTML, or prefer text.
Using many online e-newsletter programs including Mailchimp you can build your email in HTML and automatically create a text version with one click. How easy is that – an extra step that takes only a minute of your time ensuring that you have covered all bases.
3. Use Graphics that are relevant
Graphics include photos, artwork and charts or even a coloured box / text break.
Graphics are important for a couple of reasons. Firstly we know that people are more likely to read an article if it contains a graphic such as a photo because graphics, along with headlines, are the first things that the readers’ eyes are drawn to.
Secondly, graphics within a story are important as they provide a much-needed visual break from a solid block of text. A page that contains nothing but row after row of endless text does not look inviting to read.
4. Make it Easy on the Eyes
Here are two easy tricks to make your email newsletters are more visually appealing and more likely to be read:
See how it will look as you create the content: When you are writing a newsletter, set your word processing program so you are writing in the same format that will appear on recipient’s screen.
Chunk your information into sections. One big continuous paragraph is not appealing. Use the different templates and layouts software’s like Mailchimp have to offer and choose one that is best suited to the information topics you need to communicate. This may change from newsletter to newsletter however ensure that your brand is consistent and the overall ‘look and feel’ of the newsletter remains consistent.
5. Proofread, proofread, proofread
You probably wouldn’t dream of sending out a resume to prospective employers that looks unprofessional, is full of typos and contains grammatical errors.
Well it`s the same for newsletters! A newsletter represents the professionalism of your company to prospective customers. You need to make sure it looks impressive, has polished writing and is free of typos and grammatical errors. Proofreading, revising and rewriting are the most tedious, mundane parts of putting together a newsletter — but they are absolutely necessary. If in doubt have someone cast an eye over it for you prior to sending!