A couple weeks ago I received an email from my favorite aquarium store. Being a fish geek, I’m always interested in fish store sales. But this particular email caught my attention with an explosive subject line that read “Fourth of July Blowout Sale!” Sadly, the subject line was all that was explosive about it.
Upon opening the message, I discovered that the image did not display in my email browser and there were no text tags to give me clues about this fantastic sale. Not even a link to the website. Being a sucker for fish sales, I typed fishstore.com into my browser and came up with nothing. After trying a .net extension and landing on a fish taxidermy site, I Googled said store and discovered that their website was “fishstore.us.” Okay. But here’s the real kicker. Nowhere on their site could I find anything about a Fourth of July Blowout Sale. Slightly disgruntled, I closed the tab and deleted the email.
So what’s the takeaway from this experience? I think there are several things to be learned about what to do and what not to do as you’re developing an email marketing piece.
- Subject lines aren’t everything. We tend to talk about them like they are the holy grail of email marketing, but a fantastic subject line accomplishes nothing if it’s not supported by the email itself.
- Always, always, always include alt text tags and links that communicate your message even if your image fails to display.
- Don’t forget to include a link to your landing page in the body of the email, especially if your website has a weird extension like .us.
- If you’re going to send an email about a sale, make sure sale information can be easily found on your website.
- If you’re advertising a blowout sale, it better really be a blowout. If it’s not, people will begin to be skeptical of your email pieces and may skip them altogether.
Creating a stellar email goes beyond dotting all your i’s and crossing your t’s. You need a certain amount of creativity in order to be in touch with what will speak to your target audience. eConnect Email can help you design customized email templates, organize and integrate images, and test your emails before sending to ensure that they display correctly and accomplish the goals you have in mind. Don’t make the mistake of losing customers to a poorly designed email. Take the time to work out the kinks before you send, and you’ll not only increase sales, but also build loyal customers who look forward to your messages.