The Pros and Cons of HTML
If you use HTML programming for your e-mails, you gain the ability to create a much richer graphic design than available in text-only e-mails. Many audiences react favorably to the graphic elements and design flexibility that HTML permits. HTML templates allow you to include the following:
Graphics and rich text—HTML e-mail gives you immense flexibility in your newsletter designs and provides you with the ability to create a rich look and feel.
Advertising—You have the ability to place graphic ads throughout your newsletter—in the header, along the sidebars, in the footer and between your stories. By utilizing these spaces through the use of HTML, you can strategically place your ads in the positions where they’ll be most effective.
Forms— HTML allows you to put live forms into your newsletter so your readers can take action (e.g., subscribe, tell-a-friend) without having to leave your newsletter and visit the web site. Forms can, however, present some technical issues, so be sure to test any e-mail forms before sending. Tracking— Because you can track subscriptions, referrals, click-throughs, and conversions through the use of an HTML template, you are able to do more sophisticated analysis of your campaigns.
Keep in mind though that while HTML offers many opportunities, it is also subject to pitfalls. Here’s what to watch out for when designing an HTML newsletter template:
Design for design’s sake—Too often, graphic designers (and the rest of us!) try too hard to design something complicated and technically impressive and lose sight of the fact that the purpose of their newsletter is to communicate efficiently and effectively, sell products and drive their brand. Make sure your designer has a clear understanding of the purpose of the e-mail and communicates regularly with the team that is driving the e-mail newsletter initiative. The day of dazzling an audience with bells and whistles alone has passed. Subscribers demand substance, and design elements need to enhance the readability of that substance. E-mail design is not print design, or even web design.
Losing the space above the fold—Make sure your layout is sized in such a way that no single item takes up all the prime space above the fold. It’s more important to get all essential elements above the fold than to have big graphics, so get your logo and table of contents front and center so readers know why they should bother to look at the rest of the message.
Requiring downloads—Never design your template so that a reader will be required to download any additional programs (e.g., Flash) in order to view it. It’s an unnecessary barrier for lots of users.
Getting blocked by some ISPs: While this will not always be the case, there are some ISPs and corporate spam filters that will block e-mails that are too graphic intensive. Most e-mail messages come in at about 10 to 50 kilobytes. When you start exceeding 75 kilobytes, you may encounter deliverability problems.
The Pros and Cons of Text E-mails
Text-only e-mails are not as elaborate as their HTML counterparts, nor are they perceived by marketers as glamorous, but they may indeed suit your purposes very well. If your audience wants quick access to important information, such as breaking news, legal briefs or research data, it is often in your best interest to use a text format. Such material forwards in a clean manner and is more easily readable on wireless and small screen devices than HTML e-mail.
Text messages are easy to create since there are no graphics or other design elements, so they require no complex programming. The cost is minimal, and the message can reach all e-mail clients. What’s more, surveys show that one-third of e-mail readers prefer text. The preference is even higher in some market segments, such as information technology and healthcare. If research and testing prove that this is true of your target market, focus on the quality of the content and go with a text version of your e-mail. At a minimum, consider offering a text alternative to your HTML e-mail and test each to see how customers respond.
Optimizing text-only e-mails
In text-only e-mails, you can’t show product images or encourage action with buttons or enticing graphics. Don’t expect your text message to do the same heavy lifting that your HTML messages do. What’s more, you can’t track open or forwarding rates, and some key features you identify with graphics in HTML won’t be as obvious in text.
Follow these guidelines for creating your text template:
Use clear branding—Since you can’t use logos or colors, use the “From” address and subject line to identify yourself clearly.
Watch long URLs—Use short URLs, even if you have to get your IT department or service provider to use post-click redirects in order to maintain your tracking metrics. Don’t put URLs in mid-copy, even if that means you have to reword the basic message.
Move boilerplate info to the bottom—Always lead with your top story or offer. Don’t waste space at the top of the e-mail with copy that never changes from one message to the next, such as who you are, why you sent the e-mail and how readers can unsubscribe.
Use plenty of white space—Make sure you place visual breaks between and around blocks of copy. These help to highlight offers and other key details while breaking up potentially eye-numbing blocks of text.
Limit line length—Most e-mail clients truncate the line at sixty characters, so use that as your metric. Always use hard breaks at the end of each line to preserve proper sentence breaks, because you can’t count on auto-wrapping.
Limit paragraph length to four lines or fewer— This aids onscreen readability. Make sure to have a blank line between paragraphs.
Don’t use punctuation marks or symbols for emphasis—Spam filters watch out for garish punctuation marks, such as multiple exclamation points and other symbols that denote excitement. These will often cause your e-mail to be blocked.
Use a fixed-space typeface—This is one of the only ways to help achieve a consistent look among viewing windows. We usually suggest 10-point Courier or Courier New, both of which are easy to read.
Matt Blumberg and Michael Mayor are the driving forces behind Return Path, an e-mail performance company. Collaborating with them on this project are their colleagues, e-mail strategists Stephanie A. Miller and Tami Monahan Forman. This article was excerpted from their new book, “Sign Me Up! A Marketer’s Guide to Creating E-mail Newsletters That Build Relationships and Boost Sales (iUniverse Inc., 2005) © 2005 Return Path, Inc. All rights reserved.
Further EZINE LISTS Reading:
- How to Build Your E-Zine List
- How to Write an E-zine Your Subscribers Will Love (or at Least Open and Read)
- How to Start and Run an E-Mail Newsletter
