A user friendly email is purpose-driven, personalized, and easy to read. The whole concept of writing a user friendly email for marketing is to make it readable and influential for subscribers. 121 business emails are sent and received daily, according to the majority of experts. Radicati estimates that number will be closer to 126 by the end of 2019. Here are three tips that you can adopt in your email for more humanized email marketing.
- Effective first impression
- User friendly email content
- The end is the new beginning
Writing user friendly email will also help you in your behavioral email marketing strategy. Let’s explore all the tips one by one.
Effective first impression
As they say, the first impression is the last impression. While writing a user friendly email, it’s crucial to focus on the first 10 seconds of the user reading the email. If the viewer stays on your email for at least 10 seconds, they will likely read the entire email. In this period, we should improve two aspects of our email. They are:
- Subject Line
- Introduction
Subject Line
The first thing a reader notices in an email is the subject line. If they find it relevant, it increases the chance of opening the email. Keep the subject line short & relevant, and be creative with it to make it user friendly. Emotional and curious words makes a good subject line.
Introduction
The introduction part of an email is about setting expectations. Summarize the context of the email in the first 2 or 3 sentences. This practice will allow the user to know what email is all about and encourage him to read the entire email. Also, always mention the reader’s name to make the email personalized.
User friendly email content
The real value of the email is in the content or email body. Earlier, we discussed the introduction section and how to make it user friendly. Similarly, there are six aspects of a user friendly email for marketing.
- Clear Purpose Driven Email
- Write In-Depth content
- Easy to read
- Add Pictures
- Good grammar and sentence structure
- Supportive design
Clear Purpose Driven Email
When a subscriber is reading an email, he looks for a purpose. An email without purpose is not a user friendly email. The reader is least likely to read a pointless email. The email should contain an aim like opening a link, availing a discount, sending a reply, filling out a survey, or any other purpose. Make sure you are confident and clear about your motivation in the email.
Write In-Depth content
While writing an email, you must cover all the information related to the email. You should provide answers to all possible questions. If a topic is too vast to explain in the email, attach a related blog or video link to elaborate the point. It gives the reader in-depth information, which increases the overall user experience.
Easy to read
Using bullet points or numbering the prime points of the email will drastically improve the readability and user-friendliness. Also, avoid using too big or too small font sizes. As stated by Indeed, the ideal font size is 12 points, but you can customize them between 14 and 16 points. Here are some of the recommended font styles by w3school.
- Arial (sans-serif)
- Verdana (sans-serif)
- Helvetica (sans-serif)
- Tahoma (sans-serif)
- Trebuchet MS (sans-serif)
- Times New Roman (serif)
- Georgia (serif)
- Garamond (serif)
- Courier New (monospace)
- Brush Script MT (cursive)
Add visualization
Showing emotions through pictures is remarkably effective when it comes to email marketing. As Fred R. Barnard invented, one picture is worth a thousand words. Use this philosophy in your emails and make them more humanized. Use images wherever it is necessary and fits with the email context. One can also use gifs and emoticons. It makes the email look more friendly and stands out from competitors’ emails.
Good grammar and sentence structure
You might have stunning content, but subscribers might not understand it due to poor grammar and sentence structure. To check for unwanted grammar and spelling errors, helping yourself with tools like Grammarly and Ginger is a good idea. These tools can set the tone and make it look more confident to your viewers.
Supportive design
The email design is one of the most crucial aspects of user friendly email content. The layout of the email body must be supportive of your content. Try to find a simple email design that is easy to use and fits the content. Use a mobile responsive design that makes the mobile experience friendly. Generally, email marketing tools like HubSpot, Mailchimp, and other popular platforms provide a variety of supportive email designs.
The end is the new beginning
While closing, it is a good practice to conclude the entire mail and make sure you and the reader are on the same page. Also, use a call to action and encourage users to interact with the email. Here are four tips you can follow for a meaningful end.
- Structure Campaigns To Inspire Action
- Urgency and Follow-up
- Add Social Media
- Use Call to Action (CTA)
Let’s understand how you can use these four tips for a user-friendly email in your marketing.
Structure Campaigns To Inspire Action
The user-friendly email serves as an email funnel as well. The email should flow in a way that the reader is compelled to take action by the time it reaches the end. One of the most effective structures I use is four steps email segmentation.
- Introduction
- Importance and relevance of the topic
- Inspiring information about the topic
- Call to action.
Urgency and Follow-up
There is a good chance that the reader might delay the action even after reading the entire email. Here is why you need urgency and follow-up in your email marketing. The priority will make the reader take action as soon as possible, whereas follow-up will remind the user to take action.
Add Social Media
Nowadays, social media plays a crucial role in our digital marketing strategy. Adding social media to our emails provides another chance for user interaction. Also, social media links can help email marketers in avoiding spam folders.
Use Call to Action (CTA)
The purpose of sending an email is to entice recipients to take action after reading it. As a result, it is critical to instruct our users on what to do next after reading the email. Email marketers use the call to action to motivate readers to take action. While writing a user friendly email, it is good to have a call to action in your email.
I hope you are now confident enough to write a user friendly email for marketing. Please feel free to share and help others as well.