10 Ways to Improve Sending an E-newsletter/EDM
Are you finding it challenging to keep your subscribers engaged and looking to spruce up your e-newsletter (EDM)?
Sending an email newsletter or an EDM (Electronic Direct Mail) is an affordable, fast, and highly successful internet marketing technique to connect with your clients, boost your brand awareness, and convert leads into subscribers. However, it can sometimes be hard to frequently come up with fresh, original, and exciting ideas for your newsletter content.
Additionally, it can also be frustrating and disappointing when you are trying extremely hard to grow your email list, but your subscribers refuse to engage with the emails you are sending.
So how do you improve your EDMs? In this post, we will discuss different strategic techniques to improve sending your EDM. These interesting email marketing ideas will not only help you to keep your subscribers engaged but also get higher clicks and higher conversions.
1. Add Value
Apart from just providing information about new offers or announcements, the main purpose of a newsletter of an EDM is to add value. The best way to add value to your EDM is to include and explain core reports or stories that your audience might be interested in — this can be an idea or concept based on the current events or a discussion within your target community.
2. Send it More Often
If you think that sending an EDM more regularly might distract or offend your target audience, you are entirely wrong. Instead, think of it as something that adds value to their lives and helps you build a good relationship with them. It would be best if you reframed your EDM into valuable content that the audience would look forward to reading every week or day.
3. Make It Shareable
Your current subscribers can help you grow your email list. Therefore, try to make your EDM content shareable and concise with a high viral coefficient. You can accomplish this by doing giveaways and running email competitions occasionally. Make sure always to give your followers a reason to forward your newsletter.
An interesting fact, a short message with a share button below it, or an infographic are all effective strategies to inspire readers to share your email newsletter.
4. Keep it Simple
Try simplifying your EDM if you feel like the formatting looks cluttered and does not convey the message. A few pictures (not more than one or two) and a simple HTML would suffice in most cases.
If you are creating an EDM for a personal brand, then a plain-text or something similar to a plain-text is the right choice for you. This would give an impression to readers that you personally wrote the email for them. Furthermore, it would create a more significant impact if you send a reply to their message.
5. Make it Short
A lengthy EDM can be hard to track and intimidating at the same time. Your readers may prefer not to scroll all the way to the bottom if the EMD is too long. This may lead to losing crucial and valuable information about your open rate.
The tracking pixels that enable you to track open rates, usually show up at the end of an email, which means lengthy emails can cut off the tracking pixel, further resulting in a drastic reduction in the open rates.
Hence, try sending a few shorter EDM’s to see if the open rate increases. Furthermore, if you need to shorten the content and, at the same time, want your subscribers to get more information about your newsletter, attach a link to the email. This will direct users to your site and help them read the entire email text.
6. Use Mobile-friendly Email Templates
Several statistics have proven that most emails are read on mobile devices, making it crucial to have responsive email templates. Your EDM might go unread or end up in the trash if you fail to cater to the needs of people who prefer reading emails on their mobile devices.
7. Pay Attention to Images
When it comes to images in an EDM, it is tough to work out the balance. Some people prefer images, while others disable them. So, it is vital to pay attention to pictures and consider the following points:
- Check if your email newsletter really needs a background image. If not, just skip it — many marketers choose not to include images.
- If you use images, avoid hiding key information. Make sure the images you use are relevant to your newsletter content.
- If you decide not to use images, ensure that your EDM looks good without them. Instead, you can use alt text to describe images so that your newsletter still makes sense even if the images are disabled.
All in all, images can help readers focus on the right area and instantly connect them with your newsletter’s content. Hence, make sure you use eye-catching images that are simple, clear, and crisp.
8. Focus on Both an Outstanding Copy and a Great Design
At first, you may get confused about whether to focus on the copy or design of your EDM. However, it is crucial to note that both are equally important when it comes to creating a successful email campaign.
If your EDM content is not clear or does not make any sense to the reader, they might simply ignore the message altogether. And the same goes for the design of the email; if it is too complicated or confusing, it may lead to difficulty in understanding and decrease the overall performance.
Thus, you should always make sure that your EDM’s design and copy complement each other to create an engaging campaign.
9. Make it Accessible
Millions of people worldwide have hearing or visual impairments and other disabilities. Therefore, it is a good practice to ensure that people with disabilities can conveniently and easily access your emails. If you are trying to incorporate accessibility into your newsletter, consider the following:
- Avoid excessively long texts.
- Pay attention to formatting
- Use accessible fonts with large size.
- Use alt text for all your images so that readers with disabilities know what you are trying to show them.
Keep in mind that all well-designed newsletters are easily accessible, so do not forget to implement this aspect of the email marketing strategy.
10. Send it At the Right Time
You may think that the best time to send an EDM is during the day when most people are taking a break or heading off to grab lunch. However, this may not work in your favour.
Every business is different and every person you’re communicating with is different. So the best thing that you can do when trying to find the right time is test, test and then test again. And remember what might be right this month, quarter or year, might not be right for next.
Closing Words
An EDM can be a powerful way to reach people, and creating it does not have to be complicated. If you want to make a great first impression, make your EDM interesting to look at, readable and try to make it as personalised as possible.
And always remember, your readers have chosen to subscribe to your EDM because they want to hear from you. So make sure to include great content in EDMs and do not flood them with too much information.
Sending the right EDM is so important and that’s why we created our Email Marketing Checklist. Make sure that you are ticking off every box before you click send. Download your copy here.
