In the time of digital marketing, marketings keep finding new ways to reach clients in hopes of business growth or higher income. The latest digital marketing boom includes social media posts on different platforms to create shareable content and increase its customer base, brand identity, and awareness. This type of marketing does not use direct contact with an individual, and it targets a vast audience all at the same time. Other types of digital marketing tools include engaging email newsletter that connects to clients more directly and profoundly. It gives you more opportunity to create a relationship with customers and engagement. Emails newsletters spark discussion, talk, and interest in your targeted niche, all while grabbing their attention and focusing on your product or service. It’s a sly way to persuade people to buy your product or service without sounding like you’re selling. You could just convince them to join your community, and then, through proper conversion techniques, they become a prospect! If you really want to write engaging email newsletters, you have to think like a customer, as a subscriber, like someone who needs what you have to offer.
But people get tons of email newsletters every day, which is why you should make sure that your emails stand out! You have don’t want people just to delete the email to get rid of the notification! You want them to open it, read it, and engage with it. That’s the sign of properly written engaging email newsletters.
What Are Engaging Email Newsletters?
Did you know that you go through email newsletters every day without even noticing? Those annoying messages you get on the daily are basic email newsletters. But, every now and then, an email catches your eye! You’re curious about what’s in it, and you actually click on it. Now that’s an engaging email newsletter! Newsletters are emails that give your clients a chance to read up and be up-to-date on the latest news concerning your product, service, or brand. You could promote your social media platforms, give them exclusive links, or redirect them to your landing page. It helps you gain traffic, have higher conversion rates, and gain more revenue in the long-run.
Stop Writing Email Newsletters that SUCK!
Did that heading make you feel a certain kinda way? Does it trigger you? Well, it should! That’s a sign of titles that move your emotions, get you mad or curious. It gets you to keep reading. That is precisely what you should aim for in engaging email newsletters. If they just ignore it, what’s the point? So, what does it take to write email newsletters people actually want to read? We’ll let you in on all the little details you have to apply to create the best engaging email newsletters possible! Learn how to write engaging email newsletters that convert!
Bring-on The Added Value
The most significant part about being different and bringing on the unique factor is adding value to your prospects’ lives. You don’t want your email to waste your customers’ time, and it has to bring them content they could takeaway. Bring them content that sticks in their mind and drives them towards better conversion. That’s why you should add value to your content before spending time generating it. The amount of prospects and leads you currently have will increase because of it.
Reel Them in With Creative Subject Line
The first thing a prospect sees when they receive an email is the subject lines – the part that makes or breaks your engaging email newsletters. Sometimes, you have to refer to clickbait subject lines to get people to click on the email. That sounds bad, but it’s effective, and it doesn’t hurt anyone! It’s extremely important to write a solid subject line, or else people will definitely ignore your emails! Your content won’t stand a chance if your readers don’t go past the subject line.
Can You Take The Loss? You’re Missing Out!
We’re humans. That means we’re naturally very curious and worry about a lot of things! When you add a sense of urgency or sprinkle in some fear of missing out, you get successful email newsletters that are most likely to bring in conversion rates. Prospects feel an urgent need to open the email, see what you have to say, and find out more!
Create Relatable Content
If you aren’t relating to your customers’ needs, interests, and emotions, odds are they won’t care enough to check out your email. Even if you have the most exciting content, it won’t do if it isn’t relatable! With so many boats in the dock, you have to stand out and provide newsletters that people can relate to. You can use graphics and visuals to make it an overall more fun experience and keep them reading.
Bring Out Your Brand’s Culture
Email newsletters are the best chance to introduce and solidify your brand’s culture in your clients’ minds. Use engaging email newsletters to introduce your blog posts, your website, or even your social platforms. Try to feature a particular exciting blog article or highlight an Instagram post you have up. You have to make sure your personality is showing through your emails. This helps you connect more with your clients and create a solid relationship with them. You can showcase your highest achievements, your staff’s performance, or client campaigns. This is like giving them a behind the scenes sneak peek! See where all the magic happens.
Emojis Are FUN!
If your brand’s tone is more on the positive, casual side, why not use emojis? They’re great to add to your subject line, and they’re eye-catching – especially in a long list of emails. It helps your emails stand out, and prospects are more likely to click on them. You can quickly grab their attention by adding relevant emojis in the subject line. Your email won’t drown in the sea of messages in your client’s inbox!
It’s Not About YOU. It’s About THEM!
We know that you’re promoting your own product or service, but you have to think of it this way: Promote your client’s emotions, needs, and interests. Make them feel like you care about what they need. So, don’t make it about yourself. If you feel like your email includes lots of I’s and We’s, then change it up. You’re doing it wrong! Highlight everything your brand represents but in a way that highlights the benefits that your brand provides. Show them how their life becomes better with you. Provide them with tips, stories, and other information that could benefit them! Give them a reason to take some time out of their day and read your content.
Keep It Simple
You aren’t here to grade people on their reading and comprehension skills. So, don’t overcomplicate things. Just keep it simple, straightforward, and easy to read. You don’t want people to give one look at your email and regret ever clicking on it! Messages that are easy to read bring better conversion rates and people might even subscribe to your newsletter. Keep in mind your target audience and how they interact with your content. So, opt for shorter sentences and paragraphs, use bullets and visual graphics. People will appreciate the content they can skim through!
Got Proof?
Adding social proof to your engaging email newsletters is a great way to earn trust and credibility in the industry. Add a comment or testimonial from one or two of your satisfied customers, point out how large your follower base is on social media platforms, or include quality surveys on your product or service. It’s a fast and easy way to gain conversion based on performance!
CTA Saves The Day!
You shouldn’t leave your customer wondering what’s next? Tell them what to do after or during reading your newsletter. Choose an action verb that specifies what you want them to do, like Buy Now! Click the link! Subscribe! Think about what you want to come out of your newsletter and add it as a CTA!
Always Go For Plain Text
What’s the point of engaging email newsletters if not everyone can read them? That’s why you should always go for plain text formats in your letters. This is because not everyone uses the same email platform as you, so don’t use platform-dependent layouts and designs. Use formats that work with all emails – use plain text formats.
Make it Personal
Use your customer’s name in the subject line! What’s more interesting than seeing your name on an email subject line? It’s extraordinarily personal and literally calls out your name! Use a good email service platform that allows you to use the recipient’s first names in the subject line or even in the content. It’s just different when it feels like a personalized email. It gives the illusion of extra effort and care. It’s like you went to individual lengths to send a customized letter created only for that one specific client!
Be real!
The worst thing you can do when you’re trying to write engaging email newsletters is sound fake. You can’t forget that you’re communicating with human beings living in the same world you do. So, you have to be real and authentic. People will relate more when they sense that they aren’t being cheated or lied to! Real newsletters work better almost every single time you send them out. Just take a look at your own inbox; which letters are you most likely to read? There’s your answer—genuinely authentic, value-packed, and engaging email newsletters.
Create Lists
Sometimes your client base consists of different types of clientele; this is why you should segment your lists and separate your clients. You might categorize them according to market or product. That way, when you send out your newsletter, it communicates directly with specific people. It makes it more relatable and personal.
The Newsletter Takeaway
Keep in mind that you have to test everything when it comes to writing engaging email newsletters. You can’t just assume that you know exactly what people want and how they want it. You can’t say for sure that your method is full-proof even if you feel like you did everything right. Through marketing, you’re dealing with people. That’s why you have to test everything you do, optimize, and do it again. You don’t have to choose between really good subject lines, try them all! You can pick out a test sample from your client list and try out different subject lines and how people engage with them! That way, you’ll have direct data you can use all the time. You can use this test with CTAs, email content, copy, or any type of marketing content you need. Try out split-testing and get results faster.
If you’re using your email newsletter to tell a story, start at the CLIMAX of it. This will drive your customers’ curiosity through the roof! It grabs their attention and makes them wonder what happens next. So, they’ll hang around long enough to find out! You can even include attractive video thumbnails to increase engagement through opening and clicking videos. This also gives you an edge in the game! Everyone likes to watch a small fun explainer video. Besides, a video could really help provide a lot of value that synthesizes all the information you’d like them to receive.
Also, remember that you are talking to an individual person! Your emails shouldn’t seem as if you’re talking to a crowd! This will make your emails less personal. Even the timing plays a giant role. Do you want your clients to read it in the morning with their coffee? Or right before bed? It sets the whole vibe. Your emails have to sound like a flowing conversation with an old friend.
How to Write Engaging Email Newsletters
Writing a newsletter isn’t that different than writing to a friend. But there are a few things that you can do to write excellent, engaging email newsletters – ones that will bring in the conversion rates. Here’s how to write newsletters that keep your clients coming back for more information!
Can You Actually Market Your Product Through Email Newsletters?
Before you use up all your resources to create the best and most engaging email newsletters, you have to take a moment and think. Can you really market your product through email newsletters? If the answer is yes, then by all means, keep going! But, if your answer is no, then you might want to reconsider. You shouldn’t have to waste your time on something that won’t bring in conversions. Check the industry you belong it; do your competitors use newsletters? If so, what do they include in them, and how are people reacting to them? Not every industry requires newsletters. So, where do you stand in this?
What Type of Newsletter Should You Go For?
Before you dive into the actual newsletter, you have to decide your email’s type, tone, and direction. You have to make sure your emails don’t seem chaotic or random. To do so, you have to make sure that every email contains a single topic. Don’t try to discuss everything there is all in one email! People won’t keep up, and it will just be confusing. You don’t have to introduce everything about your product, service, or company in general at one time. Break it down to a series of emails. This way, you can keep them interested and have a clear understanding of what you’re trying to send out!
Don’t Shove Sales Down Their Throats!
This isn’t a product catalog that you’re passing around! Engaging email newsletters shouldn’t be all about making sales all the time! People get easily bored with excessively sales-y emails. Soon enough, they stop opening your emails altogether. This also means you shouldn’t send too many emails. This only frustrates people and leads them to unsubscribe from your email list. How many times has that happened to you? We know that we’ve unsubscribed from many websites because of this issue – especially if all the emails promote buying their products. Change it up a bit! Send your clients value instead of promotions all the time.
Set Expectations
After you’ve decided on the direction you want to take with your email newsletters, now you have to tell them what to expect. Give people reasons why they should subscribe to your newsletter and what they should expect to get from it! Tell them how often they’ll get an email from you, so they know right from the start. That is something we are sure any potential customer would appreciate knowing. No surprises. This way, people won’t feel the need to unsubscribe from your newsletter. They already know what’s waiting for them right off the start. So, they can choose to subscribe or not!
Set One CTA in Action
Okay, you can’t ask for too much from your customer all in one email. You can’t tell them to do many things at once. It’s overwhelming, and, frankly, it’s pretty farfetched. You won’t get any conversion rates from the other CTAs. Odds are they might engage in the first CTA they see. The rest will be lost! Because most people don’t even go back to the email after reacting to a CTA. It’s a different direction from there. So, choose one thing, one main thing you want your prospects to do after reading a specific email. You can choose to add other CTAs, but not make them appear as crucial as the main one. You should be able to pick out your primary CTA just by skimming through your content.
Simple Design, Simple Content
Just as we mentioned before, simplicity is key! Even the whole feel of your content should be simple and easy to read. Prospects shouldn’t feel overwhelmed by your email. So, don’t opt for flashy designs and cluttered content. Have short and straight to the point content with just enough white space to create comfort. You don’t expect people to spend more than 2-3 minutes (if you’re lucky) reading your content. You want them to stay focused long enough to reach your CTAa and act on it.
Images with Alt Text for the WIN!
Visual contents win anywhere you put them! Blog posts, social media platforms, and even engaging email newsletters. But, there’s a trick that needs an expert hack! Actually, it’s pretty easy. Sometimes images don’t load through email, and that’s where alt text comes in. So, even if the picture doesn’t load, people can still use the image for CTA or information. This is why you should always have alt text on your photos and include your CTA too!
Don’t Make it Hard to Unsubscribe
Okay, so this sounds counter-intuitive, but trust us on this. If people want to leave, you can’t force them not to! So, don’t make the unsubscribe link hard to find or confusing. Just add a simple “unsubscribe” link in case they’re looking for it. This only shows sportsmanship and professionalism. If you don’t do that, you can be marked as SPAM, and that ruins it all for you.
Adapt to Mobile Versions
Most users these days opt to use their mobile phones rather than desktops or laptops. This is because it is more convenient, and people have their phones on them all the time. So, odds your potential customers will see your email through their mobile phones. This is why you should always make sure that the design you choose is compatible with mobile phones, or else it’ll all become jumbled!
Ideas for Engaging Email Newsletters
Throwback Thursday Types of Content
So, did you have a one-hit-wonder at some point through your business lifecycle? Bring it back! People love a good throwback, and it will probably do very well too! This is an excellent method to use the resources you have at hand and drive more traffic. It’s like showcasing your most significant work! Use content that isn’t time-sensitive; for example, you probably shouldn’t use a post about a specific topic trending in the year 2012! Unless the trend is back, then it makes the perfect tie back to the past! You can even add a little update and make it more relevant!
Interviews with Leaders or Loyal Readers
An interview with an expert in the industry is something that could greatly interest your clients and prospects – especially if they love to know more about the industry! It’s an easy way to educate and engage people with your content! It also shows higher credibility and trust.
Likewise, an interview with one of your most loyal readers or clients could do wonders! Imagine how special and appreciated your customer would feel to be chosen for an interview. Other customers will also feel the amount of effort put into the customer base. Some people relate more to other customers like them, rather than someone in the field. It offers a higher chance of unbiased reviews and insights.
Interactive Content & Videos
Interactive content makes the experience of a newsletter more fun and different. It isn’t about a long paragraph or reading content anymore. You can choose to embed a video in your content to create a more dynamic feel that readers can engage with. You can also add links to videos outside your emails in case the email platform your customer uses doesn’t suppose in-message video plays! It’s always a win with videos that can sum-up everything you have to say in the email.
Structuring an Email Newsletter
So, you know all the best approaches for writing dependable, engaging email newsletters, but do you know how to structure them? The first thing people notice when they open your emails will be the structure, and then they decide whether your email provides enough value for them to keep reading or not. This all happens within seconds of opening the email! This is why the way you choose to structure your email is extremely important! Here are the best techniques to structure your newsletters to convince people to keep reading.
Scan & Skim
Most people prefer to skim through content to find out what they should take away from it. If they can’t do that with your content, you’re doing it wrong. Besides, most people use their mobile phones to check their emails. So, keep in mind that you have a very limited window of content-browsing. This makes large blocks of content impossible to read – talk about awful user experiences. Break up your content into shorter passages that are easier to read. Even better, go for bullet point if you can.
As much as 77% of your subscribers may open your emails on their mobile devices, which means they’re looking at your content in the palm of their hand. Long blocks of text that force your readers to scroll and create an awful user experience. That’s why you should break up your email copy into shorter, easier-to-read chunks. One paragraph should consist of 2-3 sentences maximum! If you want to go for a little bit more, add some bold section headers to make it more structured. Even better, opt for bullet points if you could, especially when listing items, tips, or other information.
Use buttons for hyperlinks or CTAs, so they don’t get lost in all the content. It also makes the email look much more appealing if it includes a bit of user-friendly graphics that make the experience go smoother.
Link Up!
Adding links that could support your content is a great way to earn credibility and customer trust. It just shows that your data can be backed up with studies or other types of data. You can validate your point through these reputable sources. Use other companies ‘websites as references to earn more authority and add more value to your emails. This also helps you earn off-site SEO because it will encourage other people to link back to you as well!
What’s Your CTA?
We talked about this before, but it’s worth mentioning again. Put on primary CTA in the lead, and leave the rest behind. Don’t give your customers a choice to make. Because then, one CTA will suffer on behalf of another. It’s confusing and might lead to no conversion at all. So, choose one action you want your reader to do and focus on that in one specific email. Just imagine your content should walk people down one specific path and that they should reach one destination. This isn’t a cross-road scenario!
Text- Image Balance Is Key
Another thing about structure is that your text to image ratio shows from the first glance. It’s cool to resort to visuals to help out with your content, but there should always be a certain balance between the two. Focus on how much text there is in comparison to your images. A rule of thumb is a 60-40 ratio, where your content should include 60% text to 40% images. You don’t have to stick to that rule religiously, but it does help as a guideline. If your emails include images online, there’s a huge risk it might be viewed as SPAM. It will ultimately be filtered and blocked by some email service provider. Besides, images take much more time to load than plain text. People could get bored and decide to stop reading your email. It won’t matter to them if your content interests them or not.
See You on the .com!
Well, we hope you take these tips and recommendations into consideration the next time you decide to take up writing engaging email newsletters.
Just always remember:
– Keep it short, straight to the point, and light-hearted.
– Don’t go overboard with the text or image! Moderation is the key to success!
– Always add value to everything you put into your newsletter; it’s not always about the ads and sales!
– Test your methods and optimize according to what works best.
– Optimize for mobile and desktop versions! Make sure it works for all platforms!
Let us know if you have any more tips on how to write engaging email newsletters. Be sure to take these tips into your content, and we hope to see some of your emails in our inboxes soon. If you follow these instructions to the T, you’ll most probably see your conversion rates, traffic, and revenue all start to increase! Your customer base will slowly begin to grow as well, and you’ll soon have a loyal foundation of clients to back you up. Say goodbye to the days of unsubscribing and say hello to everlasting conversion rates!
