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10 Tweaks to Take Your Email Newsletter From Meh to Must-read

By The Leadpages Team  |  Published May 20, 2020  |  Updated Oct 06, 2023
Leadpages Team
By The Leadpages Team
10 Tweaks to Take Your Email Newsletter From Meh to Must-read

Editor’s Note: The following article was penned by Guest Disha Bhatt, Sr. Content Writer at Email Uplers, and Leadpages Guest Blogger. Interested in writing for the Leadpages blog? Hit us with your best shot!

With 83% of B2B companies using email newsletters as part of their content marketing program, it is a staple for most small businesses. From engaging your leads and selling more products to staying at the top of the customer's mind, an email newsletter can be your ultimate savior when it comes to acing your email marketing strategy. That's the reason 40% of B2B marketers say that email newsletters are a critical aspect of their content marketing success.

In addition to the automated follow-ups, email newsletters are a powerful way of communicating with the clients. They help you to keep in touch with the prospects and build a stronger rapport with them. The intent behind sending newsletters consistently is that you will strengthen your brand’s credibility, instill a sense of trust in your subscribers, and be top-of-mind when it’s time for them to make a buying decision. Regular email communications, such as a newsletter, will also help the recipients stay ‘in the know’ about any updates in your services and increase the likelihood of conversion. Make sure you provide something unique with every newsletter and deliver value.

Pro-tip: Always ask yourself - “What’s in it for the subscribers,” before drafting the newsletters. If you don’t have a compelling answer, you might as well skip the send rather than risk training your subscribers to skip your emails entirely.

So, are you ready to leverage email newsletters and make your marketing strategy top-notch? However, before you do that, you must make sure your email newsletters are visually engaging to encourage readers to look forward to it. Here are 10 handy tips to help you design engaging email newsletter templates.

Dive right in or skip ahead:

1. Create a great subject line
2. Select the best sender name
3. Humanize the email
4. Balance your newsletter content
5. Go for the branding of your emails

6. Include user-generated content
7. Include high-resolution images
8. Make your CTA design top-notch
9. Work on interactivity
10. Testing is the key

1. Create a great subject line

With 35% of email recipients opening emails based on the subject line alone, it can surely play a critical role in the success of your email newsletter campaign. So, it is important to create a subject line that motivates users to click-through your email. Here's how you can do it.

  • Mobile optimization

Do you know 75% of emails are opened on smartphones?

Hence, it becomes imperative to optimize your subject line for mobile devices. It would make sure that your subject line and preheader look great across mobile devices.

  • Be original
Email subject line

To keep the attention of your subscriber base intact, it is important to be original when it comes to creating subject lines. You can make use of emojis to increase your open rates. After all, 56% of brands who used an emoji in their subject line had a higher open rate than those that did not.

2. Select the best sender name

Numerous studies have shown that subscribers index more heavily on sender name than they do on the subject line when it comes to determining whether or not they'll open an email.

Reasons for opening an email

That's why it becomes critical to include the name of a real person when sending an email instead of a "no-reply address". It wouldn't only improve your sender reputation but, also make your future deliverability rate better.

3. Humanize the email

Email newsletters get a bad reputation because the majority of them are self-serving and laden with drab and robotic language. That’s not a problem—that’s an opportunity for you to do things differently (and much, much better!). Your newsletter should be able to engage with subscribers, provide value, and connect on an emotional level. After all, it’s not ‘a subscriber’ opening up your email—it’s a human being.

Pro-tip: Ask yourself – "How are you connecting meaningfully with the reader on the other end?"

4. Balance your newsletter content

According to HubSpot, a great newsletter should be made up of 90% of educational content followed by 10% of promotional content. Remember, your subscribers didn't sign-up for your newsletter to receive your overly promotional content all the time. So, avoid doing excessive self-promotion. Instead, send them relevant content that's not only educational but timely and informative too. However, you can promote your products and services once in a while if there's some big announcement related to it. Below is an email template example from Field Mag. See how it balances both the aspects like a pro.

Field Mag

5. Go for the branding of your emails

Consistency is the key to the success of any marketing campaign. That's why it is critical to work towards the branding of your emails. You can do so by including your logo along with an avatar or photo that you use across various other channels. Further, make it a point to use the same template for a particular series of emails. It will channelize the expectation of customers well while making them accustomed to your newsletter. Simply put, branding your emails right and maintaining its consistency can encourage your user base to look forward to your email newsletter, thereby increasing your engagement considerably.

Email newsletter

6. Include user-generated content

According to Nielsen, 92% of customers trust earned media like user-generated content over other forms of advertising. Therefore, brands must consciously try to leverage stronger customer relationships to convert subscribers into buyers. A great idea is to include user-generated content in newsletters that encourage prospects to relate to your products and services because of their connection to your community and a desire not to miss out on something.

Here's how Charming Charlie organized a branded hashtag campaign that not only garnered social media attention but also helped in pushing the customers closer to conversion. The good part is such templates are easy to create with DIY or drag-and-drop editors.

Charming Charlies email newsletter

7. Include high-resolution images

You can make an impactful statement through your email if you use a relevant and high-resolution image. However, don't make excessive use of images. Maintain the text to image ratio at 80:20 so that there are no deliverability issues. Also, make sure you add suitable ALT text in all your images. It would help the user know what the image is all about if the email client doesn't display the image by default. HomePolishknows how to do it the right way.

HomePolish Newsletter

8. Make your CTA design top-notch

Your Call-to-action (CTA) plays a critical role in engaging your customer base. Therefore, making it top-notch should be your priority. You can do so by making it visible and actionable. Further, make sure it appears multiple times in different formats, both as a link and a button. Also, keep in mind that colors play a critical role in creating top-notch CTAs. While red is a sign of urgency, you can also make use of black and blue for urgency and trustworthiness respectively. In short, choose a color that can best resonate with the content of your email. Take a look at this chart below that will help you choose the right CTA color for your email newsletter.

CTA color for your email newsletter

9. Work on interactivity

With 82% of subscribers preferring interactive email campaigns over static messages, interactivity certainly is a great way to enhance engagement as well as conversions.

mail campaigns over static messages

Consequently, from GIFs and videos to cinemagraphs, there are a lot of interactive elements that you can leverage to get the best result out of your email newsletter campaign. Here's an interactive email example from Contiki that uses a video to capture the subscriber's attention. Take a look.

10. Testing is the key

Now, before hitting the send button, the last step is to test your email newsletter. Remember, every business is different and so are their goals and objectives. So, make sure you choose strategies that move the needle towards achieving those goals. This is where testing your email newsletter can come in handy. Start by A/B testing your email subject lines. Evaluate each and every element of your newsletter and see what works best for you.

That's a wrap

The best part about sending an email newsletter is the ability of the marketer to control all the elements of the content that you are crafting for your user base. The main thing to keep in mind is to do it in a way that brings the best out of your email campaign. Remember, when subscribers give you permission to send them a newsletter, make sure to keep up to their expectations by delivering to information that they are looking for. Take some inspiration from the above-mentioned points and design email templates that increase both your engagement and sales.

Disha Bhatt

Meet the author

Disha Bhatt
Sr. Content Writer

Disha Bhatt is Sr. Content Writer at Email Uplers, which specializes in crafting professional email templates, PSD to HTML email conversion, and custom templates in addition to providing email automation, campaign management, and data integration & migration services.

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Leadpages Team
By The Leadpages Team
10 Tweaks to Take Your Email Newsletter From Meh to Must-read
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