5 critical design factors for email marketers

Posted: May 13th, 2011 by Suzanne Stock 1

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There are many factors that contribute to a successful email campaign – timing, relevance, offer and content being among the most important. But to maximise conversion it’s also important to consider design.   Here are five design factors that will ensure your emails hit their target.   

Don’t include too many images

Make sure that your emails contain a balanced mix of images and web-based text. Over-use of images can trigger spam filters. And avoid sending single large images, as they are particularly vulnerable.

Optimise all images for the web   

I’m not referring to the physical size of your images but the actual file size and image resolution. Image resolution, or DPI, refers to the number of dots, or pixels, per square inch of an image. Larger file sizes take longer to download and can result in images taking too long to appear.  Images can be optimised using graphics packages, such as Photoshop, Illustrator and Paint Shop Pro, etc. The web displays graphics at 72 DPI, so for maximum download speed this is what you should be aiming for.

Consider mobile devices

More and more people are using their mobile devices as a primary email tool. It is therefore vital that your designs should still be readable when scaled down. Until recently, most mobiles coped badly with HTML emails, often showing a fragmented template or no images whatsoever. To have any hope of delivering a successful email it was important to think of the mobile device as a separate email platform altogether.  Fortunately, with the arrival of the iPhone, Android and BlackBerry smart phones the distinctions between mobile devices and desk/ laptops are becoming fewer and less critical. To ensure readability, the golden rule is to keep the width of your templates less than 600 pixels.  This width also works well in desktops and laptops.  If in doubt seek professional help.

Add alt tags to all images

An alt tag is simply a piece of text that sits beneath an image that describes what it is. Some email programmes, such as Outlook, turn images off by default.  Without an alt tag, therefore, recipients of your emails have no way of knowing what your images are about.  If they see a clearly defined alt tag, they are more likely to enable images and read your email.

Test, test and retest

Finally, it’s important to test your email designs as often as possible. Web-based providers such as Hotmail, Yahoo! and Gmail frequently change their rendering criteria. Just because an email works well one day, it may not do so on another.  Prior to conducting a campaign, wherever possible, send test emails to all main platforms to ensure that your design is working as it should.  If you aren’t happy with the result, tweak the design (and, if necessary, the text) until you are.