NEWSLETTER
How To: Design Newsletters That People Actually Read
According to studies, we receive around 9,400 emails a year. That's about 25 emails a day. Although the competition is fierce, sending email campaigns is one of the most effective marketing methods. How do you make yourself stand out in the world of newsletters? We show you 8 criteria for the perfect newsletter.
Written by Hannah Krüger
8 Tipps For The Perfect Newsletter
The goal of email campaigns is to drive conversions. Users should not simply remain interested parties, but be converted into buyers. At best, they will become loyal customers. With email marketing, you stay in touch with your customers by informing them about new products, discount promotions and other exciting topics. What exactly does a perfect newsletter look like?
1. First Impression Counts
What do your recipients see before they open your newsletter? The name of the sender, the subject line and the preheader. These three components are crucial in determining whether your mail is opened or ignored.
Sender
The name of the sender must look trustworthy. Under no circumstances should the name be reminiscent of spam mail or phishing. In order for the sender to be received positively, a few criteria should be met:
List company name
List the name of a team member, such as Max from JUNE
Use special characters, capital letters or vertical strokes
Do not include more than 20 characters or the sender will be truncated by some email clients
It should also be noted that you should immediately recognize who the mail is from. If you have decided on a sender name that works particularly well, it should be used for the long term. Constantly changing the sender name can seem confusing and unserious. But not only the sender name is important. The email address used to send the campaign should also be professional. Avoid free email addresses from Gmail or Outlook. Place value on an exchange with your users. Here, no-reply addresses are a no-go. Your business can benefit from user responses, in the form of constructive feedback. An e-mail address with a unique company name is recommended.
That's How It Works With JUNE
Within the sending process, you can define the sender and the email address.
- Go to the Campaign menu
- Click on “create new campaign” and “create new email campaign”
- You can now make your changes under Content
Subject Line
The subject line is the first piece of information about the content of your newsletter. It is therefore extremely important in determining whether your newsletter will be opened and read. Unfortunately, there is no formula for the perfect subject line. Therefore, you should pay special attention to the following:
Catchy, exciting, short wording
Use exciting keywords
Address customers directly
Use appropriate emojis like 🎉⭐️🤘💙
Use time restrictions like “only available today”
Do not use filler words
Length: 30-60 characters
The subject line as a whole should be promising and honest. If the teased promise is not kept, disgruntled recipients will unsubscribe. Addressing the recipient personally is particularly successful. If the subject line mentions the user's name, this creates an individual buying experience.
Be inventive and test different subject lines. Always keep in mind: The interest should be aroused and the added value of your mail should be understood immediately.
How it works with JUNE
The subject line can be defined even before you design your newsletter.
Go to the email editor
Click the Settings icon on the left sidebar
Enter your subject line under “Document” and “Subject Line”
Preheader
The preheader can be seen like the second subject line and should therefore not be underestimated. When writing the preview text, pay attention to the same criteria as for the subject line (see above). Furthermore, up to 110 characters can be used. In comparison to the subject line, the statement should be formulated in more detail here. Attention: Always make sure that a preview text is defined before sending. If you forget, an automatic preheader will be created. In most cases, the sentence in the mail is used. These are often called “If you no longer wish to receive this newsletter, click here” or “Are you having problems viewing it? Click here for an online view”.
That's How It Works With JUNE
Just like the subject line, the preheader can be easily written in the editor
- Go to the email editor
- Click on the Settings icon on the left sidebar
- Enter the desired preview text under “Document” and “Preheader”
2. Choose Dispatch Time
The perfect time depends on your target audience, industry, and type of email. If you are sending emails in the B2B sector, weekdays in the morning hours are best. In the B2C sector, weekends are an additional factor. Take a look at your analytics tools like Google Analytics or our in-house dashboard. These show when your recipients interact with the mailings or are online. These times represent successful mailing times.
Other preferred times:
- 7-8 a.m.: your users are still in bed or on their way to the train
- 10 a.m.: several studies show that this is the best time to send emails
- 12-13 p.m.: most people have a lunch break here and some time to check their inboxes
- 7-8 p.m.: at closing time, on the way home or before sleeping, people read emails
If you're not sure what the perfect time to send is, simply test out different times and then compare engagement rates.
Caution: Are you sending newsletters to international subscribers? Here it can happen that some of your users receive the newsletter in the morning and others again at midnight. Therefore, segment your recipients by country or time zone.
That's How It Works With JUNE
Within the sending process, you can choose the appropriate time as well as the perfect date.
- Go to the Campaign Menu
- Click on “Create New Campaign” as well as “create new email campaign”
- Under “Send” you can now specify the appropriate date in the calendar overview
3. Exciting Content
When choosing content for your email campaigns, it is recommended to take the customer's perspective. What interests do they represent? What do they want? What kind of needs do they have? Always keep the target audience in mind!
Compose texts
The length of the entire newsletter also depends on your target group. Divide long texts into paragraphs and give them several headings. Many of your recipients will not read the entire newsletter, but only scan individual sections. Thus, your headlines should sound catchy. Storytelling can also be a diversified method to always deliver exciting content.
That's How It Works With JUNE
The Rich Text Editor as well as the Styles menu offers you limitless design possibilities. Custom fonts or Google Fonts can be used very easily. With the help of our exciting components, you can build varied newsletters – without any technical knowledge.
Segment
A big factor in success is segmenting your recipients. There are different strategies for segmenting. For example, segmenting by gender is suitable for an online fashion store. Furthermore, you can segment by interests or content preferences, such as blog posts, sale launches, product updates, service notifications, etc.
With segmentation, you send out more targeted content that is much better received than non-segmented content. Important information for segmenting, such as gender or location, can be collected during the opt-in process. Read more about segmentation here.
Address personally
Greet your customers by name in your mails, especially in the first welcome mail, a personal address is particularly suitable. Furthermore, customer-specific content can be sent.
That's How It Works With JUNE
Effectively dividing large mailing lists and sending personal campaigns does not require any technical skills. However, a few settings need to be made in the JUNE Editor. For this, we recommend our internal lesson on segmentation, which will guide you through the process step by step.
4. Innovative Design
Delivering perfect content and actions alone is not enough to convince! How you present your content plays a crucial role. A vivid design makes engagement rates skyrocket.
Pay attention to the company's style guide. The design of your email campaigns should match the rest of your brand. Use colors, fonts, and images that are also present on the website, for example. A consistent image creates trust.
Your newsletters are read on different devices. Your texts should be easy to read in any case – even with exciting color combinations.
The CTA button is the key to your newsletter. It leads the subscriber to a product or landing page. Make the button stand out with color and style, and at the same time it should be coherent with the rest of the mail.
That's How It Works With JUNE
The Styles menu lets you define custom colors, called Base Colors. Later, you can easily access them using the Richtext Editor.
- Go to the Style menu and click on “Base Colors”.
- Select a desired color or enter a color code here
- Don't forget to save your settings.
- Now click on a text component so that the Richtext Editor opens automatically. Your settings from the Styles menu can now be found here.
5. Clear Structure
Head
According to the “Above the Fold” principle, the upper part of a newsletter is the most important, as it is seen immediately without having to scroll. The most important information of the mail should be placed here, in the form of a large headline. Above the headline can be your logo or your navigation, if you run an online store. Regardless of which variant you choose, a recognition value should be given, so that your users immediately know which brand is behind the mail.
Body
The head part should transition smoothly into the body. For example, a large image can be used here, which is already teased in the head area. Images, graphics, or GIFs are excellent for presenting content in a clear and uncomplicated way. Make sure that large images and GIFs do not consume too much disk space. Compress your files to speed up the loading process—because no one wants to wait! The call-to-action button should be displayed within the graphic at best. The call-to-action such as “Buy Now” can be repeated multiple times within the mail. The CTA should still be precisely worded in three to four words in the imperative.
Footer
In the closing part of your newsletter, some elements should be specified without fail
- Opt-out
- Link to the imprint
- Link to browser view
- Links to your social media profiles
You should always include the first three items. The option to opt-out as well as the forwarding to the imprint are legally obligatory. If an email client blocks all content, the browser view is a good way to display all mail content without any problems.
That's How It Works With JUNE
The large selection of components offers you endless design possibilities. Buttons, icons, and texts can be conveniently styled according to your wishes. With the easy drag-and-drop function, no technical skills are required.
6. Pay Attention To Responsive Design
The majority of your subscribers will surely read your mail via mobile view. Therefore, you should take care that grids, buttons, or forms are not broken. Furthermore, the text should always be readable on all devices. Also, make sure that the images are displayed perfectly in mobile view as well as on a large desktop. The structure of the newsletter should always be recognizable.
That's How It Works With JUNE
While designing, you are constantly able to switch between the different device views. Furthermore, you can hide individual components for a specific view. On the whole, JUNE takes care of your Responsive Design. Therefore, you only need to adjust small optional changes, if any. You save time and can focus on the content of your campaigns.
7. Testing, Testing, Testing
Email clients give most designers and programmers a stomachache. They publish unannounced updates and block any content in your mail. Every email client like Apple Mail, Yahoo, Gmail & Co. has different rules. Therefore, send your mails to your coworkers. At best, check them with different devices and email service providers (ESPs).
That's How It Works With JUNE
During the design, you can see the newsletter in preview mode as well as send test emails with a few clicks. Furthermore, our components are programmed to display perfectly with all email clients. Outlook also displays JUNE newsletters without any problems.
8. Last but not least: Analyze
Your newsletter design should never be a fixed piece of work, but should continuously optimize itself. Track and analyze each campaign, e.g., with Google Analytics. Work out which campaign has the most open and click-through rates. It is advisable not only to look at the newsletters that were interacted with particularly frequently, but also to analyze the campaigns that were not well received. Ask yourself what could have caused it.
That's How It Works With JUNE
With JUNE's analytics tool, you can select the tracking you want and create your own customized dashboard. After each sent campaign you can see engagement rates, which users are particularly active, where your users are located and much more! Linking with Google Analytics is also possible.
Go to the settings menu on the left sidebar
Select “Tracking” at the top
Click on “Google Analytics”
Here you can now set the four essential parameters utm_campaign, utm_source, utm_medium and utm_content.
Conclusion
There are countless criteria that can lead to a perfect newsletter. There is no formula for the successful newsletter. However, it is especially important to always keep the target audience's perspective in mind. It is essential to know what is expected from your newsletter subscription. Get in touch with your users and get to the bottom of successes and failures.
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