by Melinda Krueger

Is your e-mail design guilty of these 4 sins?

1. Envy. E-mail designers–as well as those who approve and review e-mail–all seem to envy those who do print ads. We act as though readers will look at an e-mail in its entirety, as if it were a page in a magazine. When reviewing them, we print e-mails out, open them to fill our computer screen or pin them up in conference rooms and stand three feet back. As a result, we make decisions based on the overall composition. We KNOW that readers view them in small slices in preview panes, frequently with images blocked, but we somehow refuse to take this into consideration. This is a sin that leads to…

2. Gluttony. Graphics very often consume more of the e-mail
space and focus than they require. The role of graphics is to guide the
eye through the COPY, not dominate the view. In test after test, we see
that copy-heavy e-mails deliver more sales than the short & sweet.
Don’t believe it? Perhaps you are guilty of…

3. Pride. Professionals without experience in data-driven
marketing frequently believe their opinion is paramount. They eschew
testing because they know what is best. If, on the other hand, you have
had hard data refute your pet theories, your mantra changes from "I
would never do that" to "Let’s test it." Many of the principles of
direct and e-mail marketing are counterintuitive. Know what works,
don’t assume you know, or you may fall victim to…

4. Sloth. You have a design that looks great in your inbox,
but how does it look when rendered by the many different e-mail clients
and ISPs? Consider investing in a tool, such as that offered by Pivotal
Veracity or Lyris, which shows how your e-mail will look in a variety
of environments. Or develop a giant seed list and view
already-delivered e-mails in order to improve upcoming efforts.

Your e-mail program may be doing just fine, thank you, while
committing these design "sins." But, as Flint McGlaughlin of
MarketingExperiments.com said at the Marketing Sherpa conference,
"Adequacy is the enemy of creativity." Understand how readers view your
e-mail, subordinate graphics to copy, and test, test, test. Move from
adequate to outstanding.

Source: MediaPost’s Email Insider