Email: Thought Of Your Mobile Audience?

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Your smartphone is your latest computer. You run your life with it - check email, order books, buy movie tickets and more.

As much as 44% of emails are opened on mobile devices, says a recent study by Experian Marketing Services.

Studies show that people love to clear their inbox while they are on the move or in a coffee shop. They scan emails on their smartphones late at night and early in the morning, after they shut down their laptops. The rule around the “best time to send emails” goes out the window with this device.

Your text emails may not be legible but at least they will render well. But what about those fancy HTML emails you spent hours to design?

Here are some live examples of what mobile optimized emails can do.  

• The Salvation Army got a click through rate of over 55% with its mobile optimized email donation campaign. (Source mobilemarketer.com).
• Medical information website, Medscape raised its newsletter click through rate by 53% with a mobile version, says a MarketingSherpa case study.

While many companies have switched to responsive design for their websites, most haven’t done much with their HTML emails. Unlike a mobile optimization for the website which is a one-time effort, email campaigns are triggered ever so often. Email for the mobile is an ongoing effort which involves resources, time and effort.

To decide whether to plunge into mobile or not, check what devices are used to read your emails. Tools like SEO Resources can give you this information. Is there a significant smartphone/tablet audience? Does the number justify the extra effort? If not, you can always wait.

If yes, do you want to design one email which will work across various platforms or go for a separate mobile version? Experts recommend one fluid email design that will work across devices, since a separate mobile version involves an extra click for the user and duplication of effort for the design folks.

Below are some tips to follow when you design for the small screen.

• Keep your subject line brief and pithy. Only the first 20-30 characters will appear.
• Frame your preview text carefully. This could decide whether your email gets opened or not.
• Place the most important content first so as to draw in the reader.
• Use fewer words and shorter sentences. Keep your sentences within 60 characters to avoid ugly line breaks.
• Get straight to the point with your content. Provide bite-sized information, easy to consume on the go.
• Use capitalization, highlighting, line breaks in plenty to separate messages, links etc.
• Design for mobile rather than design for a desktop and then squeeze it into a small screen.
• Plan for fingers and touch. Your viewer will use his finger to select a link or press a button and not a mouse. Factor in the fat finger syndrome. Use plenty of white space around and between links and buttons. 
• Use large call to action buttons. Apple suggests a pixel area of 29X44 for any clickable area.
• If there is a link, go old school and underline it. Consider a larger font so it’s easier to select with a finger.
• Use font size of 14 points for the body text and 30 points for the headline. This way people don’t have to zoom in to read.
• Don’t put more than four items in your navigation bar.
• By default, images are blocked on most mobile devices. So make sure your message is complete sans images.
• Images are a double edged sword. They are attractive but at the same time they take time to load. 
• Use media queries in CSS to increase the width of your email from a set width to full screen.
• If you frequently run email marketing campaigns, you can consider designing responsive design templates. These templates will adapt to varied screen sizes, push up font sizes and make it readable.
• Test across different devices to see how it renders – is the text legible, are the buttons clickable, are the line breaks uniform?
• Don’t just stop at email design for the mobile. Your email most likely leads to a landing page. Optimize that too.