Email Advertising Layouts - Five Tips for Success
Invention Development Advice - Marketing
Layout is often overlooked because email marketers focus too much on the copy and the graphics and ignore how they all work together. Many messages are too busy and confusing to clearly show the reader what is expected and others are too boring to bother looking at. A good layout will catch the reader's attention and keep it long enough for them to respond properly.
by SteveO'Bryan


Layout is often overlooked because email marketers focus too much on the copy and the graphics and ignore how they all work together. Many messages are too busy and confusing to clearly show the reader what is expected and others are too boring to bother looking at. A good layout will catch the reader's attention and keep it long enough for them to respond properly.

To maximize the return on your email marketing campaign you must focus on the effectiveness of your layouts as much as anything else. Graphics are an easily abused element of email layouts. Studies show that a reader will give your message about seven seconds before they make a decision on what to do with it, but you have even less time than that to make a good first impression. If you put too many graphics in your messages your readers will not be able to process them all in such a short amount of time. Keep your graphics simple and easy to understand and you cannot go wrong.

Images are usually disabled when messages are first opened. If you have too many images in your emails then loading them will take up most of the precious time you have to catch your reader's attention. Be sure to only use graphics that will add to the effectiveness of the message. Place as few graphics as possible in your messages and never more than four.

Placing several links in your message will improve both the click-through rate and your reputation. Email service providers will recognize you as a legitimate email marketer if readers click on your links, and having multiple links in your messages you will increase the likelihood of the reader clicking on in. Try to incorporate five to seven links in all of your emails.

Use copy sparingly. Too much copy will be the death nail of any email. Most people's attention span is not long enough to read through a lot copy and figure out the email's purpose. Write something brief and captivating that will create interest for the reader. Then have them click-through to a landing page where you can say everything you need to.

If you have read my other articles you will know that I, like many other internet marketing professionals, always harp on testing. With email layouts make sure you test to find out what works. A/B testing will improve click-through rates like nothing else you can do. Continually work to improve on your best campaign. Learn from your mistakes and capitalize on your successes.

Another way that you absolutely must test your emails is to do a trial run before you send a message to all of your contacts. Sign up for all the main services your contacts use and first send your messages to your own accounts. You will learn two important things from this test. First, not all email clients display messages the same way. Checking to see how they appear in the browsers will prevent you from wasting a message. The second thing to look for is deliverability. If one message gets filtered by a particular client, it will likely get filtered for everyone who uses that client. This test is well worth the effort. Remember - test, test, test, both A/B and trial.

Do not neglect the layout of your emails and you will not fall into the trap that so many email marketing professionals do. A good layout will take the most advantage of every open and help get your click-through and conversion rates to a level that will make your competition very jealous.

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