Oct
20
Things Your Email Designer Must Know
An email is not a website. A site usually takes up the full browser window; but in an inbox or email client, email occupies only a fraction of the window. Further, email content above the fold (visible without scrolling) is the most valuable part, and could be the only part that’s read. And remember, most ISPs and email clients disable images by default. Nevertheless, email is still an effective marketing medium.
This is the first part in a two-part series on Things Your Email Designer Must Know. Do remember to share this with your design team. Here’s what they need to know-
- Call-to-Action (CTA): It’s best to include a text-based CTA button above the fold. All those “Register” and “Click Here” buttons must be visible above the fold, without scrolling.
- Restrict Width of the Template: It should not be more than 500 to 600 pixels.
- Keep Message File Size Under Check: It mustn’t exceed 100kb.
- Use Image Alt Text: This serves as back-up text when images are not displayed.
- Use Resized Images: Don’t just resize the dimensions of a large image in HTML code as it will not render correctly in all email clients, especially Outlook. Instead, resize the images as per the requirements of the template.
- Use Absolute Image Paths: All images must be hosted on a server. For instance, if you upload your images onto the SEO Resources server, ensure that the image file names do not have any spaces in them and thereby avoid %20 in your image URL. The image paths should end with a .jpg or .gif and never with .com. Avoid .png images as they are not supported in some email clients.
- Apply Inline Styles: Inline styles work around email clients that strip out CSS from the head or external CSS files. It also gives priority over webmail client styles.
- Use Table Tags: Use table tags and not div tags. Elements like font type and size can be used within table tags, but individual styles should be placed on td's.
- Close all HTML Tags.
- Avoid Single Image Templates: Don’t embed your text and graphics onto a single image. If images are disabled, the email will show up blank and could be interpreted as spam.
Want to read the second-part of HTML dos and don’ts?
Design your way to better email deliverability!
