Ruan Benade, our Head of Design, answered some questions frequently asked by email marketers when trying to decide on a design for their email newsletters. We picked his brain for design and technical tips, handy resources and advice on how you can design your newsletters for optimal results.
Do I need to be a designer to create and edit an email newsletter?
Yes and no. Firstly we need to differentiate between “designing” and “building” a newsletter. The former requires some creative skill and an ability to use design principles to create a striking and engaging experience, the latter requires knowledge of HTML and CSS as well as experience in how emails render differently to say, websites.
So, to answer the question, it will certainly help to be a designer if you want to design great looking websites… or to have experience in coding to build emails that display consistently across all browsers. On the other hand anyone can edit or modify an email newsletter using the kind of software that GraphicMail offers.
I want to design an email that’s visually appealing for my subscribers. How do I go about that?
A designer will use a combination of layout, graphical elements, color and images to make an email visually appealing. A novice will often cram a design full of graphic elements and colors in the belief that it lends impact, whereas the extra clutter will ironically end up detracting the user from the true content and images. So my advice to non-designers would be to keep the layout very clean with maybe a splash of color here and there, and use images. Great images combined with large catchy headings are your best weapon. Also remember to place your best image at the top of the newsletter where it will be seen first.
Do I use more images, or more text, or equal amounts of both?
There is no general rule here. A photography business or online product shop will feature more images, whereas a financial company will have more copy. It is important here to know your market and to understand what they are looking for in your newsletter. If you are showing pictures of generic smiling business people to your clients, when they are in fact looking for up to date market info then you are not providing valueto your subscribers.
What are my options online for buying or sourcing "free" images?
You can buy images for a set fee (royalty free) from the bigger online image banks like www.gettyimages.com or you can use pre-purchased credits to buy images from the new generation of cheaper image banks like www.istockphoto.com or www.123rf.com. These sites sell photos, illustrations, video files, sound files and even flash files. Keep in mind that the cheaper images are not yours exclusively to use and so your competitors are free to go and use the same images that you have just spent days building a campaign or look with. Here you truly get what you pay for.
Most images online are subject to standard copyright laws. “Free” online images are usually licensed under the “creative commons licensing agreement” which has various requirements, for instance that you have to credit each picture you use. (Read more about that here.) You can find free images supplied by the public on sites like www.sxc.hu and www.morguefile.com.
How can I edit my images? Are there any free online tools?
Designers traditionally use powerful software programs like Adobe Photoshop, but for simpler editing work there are a number of free online options. Check out www.sumopaint.com, www.picnic.com or www.pixelr.com. Stay tuned as we will feature a review of free online editing tools on our blog in the coming weeks.
Should my emails look as similar as possible to my website?
Your branding should always be as consistent as possible across all your promotional media whether print or online. An email newsletter or e-flyer should not try to be an exact copy of your website but a simpler introduction to what your business and website offers. Your logo, colors and corporate personality should be instantly recognizable no matter what the medium.
What should I avoid when creating my newsletter?
Needless to say avoid creating dull and uninspired email communication :)
On the technical front there are a number of things to avoid. I would need a whole new article to cover this so that’s another blog article in the making. Generally emails need to be coded in tables and should feature inline styles as far as possible. Don’t use floats or PNGs and avoid background images. Oh and wrap your whole email in a table or div with inline styles or Google will strip out your background color.
What can I do to be sure my email renders well across all email clients?
Be informed on what to avoid when designing and building emails. Then test the emails before sending. There are 20+ email clients and as there are no email standards in place, they will all render your email differently.
The most comprehensive testing option is to pay for an online testing service. You send a test email to a given address and you get to see previews of how it is rendered in all the existing email clients. One such a service is www.litmusapp.com. GraphicMail has partnered with a trusted testing provider and will soon provide this as a paid for service.
Of course you always have the option of signing up for free testing accounts on online email clients, but that still leaves the Mac and PC platform and their respective default email clients. Not to even mention iPhone and other mobile clients as well.
Which is better: Customizing a free template or having a custom template specially designed?
A custom template designed and built by a professional is definitely the best option. This is of course a once-off cost. After that you should just save a draft and edit your draft newsletter every time you need to send.
If, however, you are on a tight budget then there is the option of modifying a free template and adding in your branding and content.
Any other handy tips you can share with us?
Always provide alt text for images. So even when most email clients block images by default you will still be able to see the alt text descriptions.
Be warned that there are still a few email clients that don’t display alt tags when images are blocked.
Good luck!