I read with interest a post by my email client of choice, Campaign Monitor, who published some figures after conducting an analysis of 2.2 million emails sent by clients from a variety of industries and countries.
Anyone who spends the time to crafting emails to send to a target audience – from newsletters to fundraising appeals – keep a very close eye on open rates. And for good reason. According to Campaign Monitor, even though the number of emails being sent is growing, the number of clicks is declining.
So, to assist with creating best practices for your email campaign, here are some rules that emerge from successful email campaigns:
- Your primary call to action should be at the top (or above the fold) of your email;
- You should offer multiple opportunities to complete a call to action throughout the body of the email;
- Buttons, rather than links, get a much better response for calls to action;
- Use contextual links (in images, on certain key text, etc) and not just buttons;
- Craft concise, bold subject lines
It’s a fascinating article – you can read it all here.
In many cases, it’s not just enough to have your audience open your email. In many cases you want them to take a specific action, be it donate, sign up for email updates, watch a video or some other activity.
These guidelines will hopefully offer some insight on how to design your next email to ensure those actions are taken by your audience.