April 27, 2011

HTML Newsletters Guide

Hi Friends,

Newsletters are like a marketing/sales representative of your company for your clients.In the worked of internet, companies are making use of Internet Marketing to do marketing and sales of there services.
But as the Sales representative have some guidelines of "How to Look" to make the first impression same is the case with the newsletters too.So, here are the few basic guidelines for your newsletters:-

1) Say No to Images
We have to understand that the Newsletters are very much different from the websites.Newsletters are depend upon the mail boxes and where by default images are blocked and receiver is only getting a square with the cross sign that image is not coming and moreover your message in image is lost.

So try to avoid images and if you are using images then always design in that way that images are not covering any important message.

2) Alt tag is your friend
Alt tag is the alternative text of the images, so when you are using the images make sure you are utilizing the alt tag very well
you can provide the information what they have in the image by the alt text.Also get extra creative as I used to do...I used to make alt tag as CTA by giving the alt text "Avail FREE Gifts on a click" or "Explore the New Features"
such alt tags create the user to click and give them break from the bore alt tags.


3) Not Everything Should be A tag
Many times designer try to get the click they put the whole content into the a tag but they forget that could actually irritate the users and also we should never
under-estimate the users they can judge by seeing so many links that its just a technique of getting clicks and might hurt your reputation too.
So, the best way to make the special keywords links and not more than 5-6 words in one paragraph
and make sure to leave the default color of links as it will help to recognize them better.

Also, images should also be link always as it is the tendency of users to click on the images and you cant tolerate to loose any single click


4) CTA is most important
CTA (CALL TO ACTION) is the main core thing of the every newsletter and CTA should be bold,clear and having very clear message on it.eg:- Register Now!! , Talk To Us Now!!, Order Now!!, Grab your Copy Now!!
Having 2-3 CTA in newsletter will help you to get the attention of users, but its not necessary to get 2-3 CTA only 1 bold CTA can do the magic but it all depends upon the requirements and design of your.


5) Width and Height matters
Sometimes to adjust our content we don't consider the Height and width of the newsletters and that become a dangerous step for newsletters.Newsletters with lengthy height and big width taking the whole inbox space irritate user.So, always keep a red alarm when crossing the width/height.It is OK to have the Newsletters size can be from 600px to 800px but try to avoid cross that size and also keep checking the length too.Lengthy newsletters means scrolling the content and as we are already checking the NL in the mail box the half of the top is occupied by the mail items, which means above the scroll is occupied we have to design the newsletter is such a way so that we could avoid too much scrolling.

6) Subject Line
Subject line of newsletters is like the envelope of your mail, if the user didn't like the envelope he never gonna open it.So while selecting the subject line make sure it is attractive subject line enough to make receiver to click on it and open your mail.

7) Content is king here too
Like web the content is king here too but like web don't make one page content.Write your content short and straight.Also, try to break your content in sub-parts or sections.You can also add bullets points and heading to make your content readable.Make the key points BOLD.So that in first look the user can scan the bold points first.

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