When it comes to great email newsletters, there are three important things that could mean the difference between recipients clicking open, delete or spam.

1. Sender

The “From” line of your email is often overlooked by many companies. It shouldn’t be. Studies show that this is one of the first things that people look at when they receive an email.

The goal of the “From” line is to have people recognize the email sender.

It’s important to be consistent with the name that appears on the email. You’ll want to use your organization’s name in the sender line of the email.

If you want to use someone’s name in the sender line, you’ll want to make certain that the person is 100 percent committed to your company for the long term and is easily recognizable.

When using your company name in the “From” line, avoid using unrecognizable acronyms like RONB for Right On – No Bull Marketing.

Be sure to set up an email address for the newsletter such as Newsletter@MyCompany.com or Info@MyCompany.com. Give employees, who will interface with email recipients, access to this email. It helps when someone replies to the newsletter.

2. Subject Line

When developing a subject line for your email newsletter, you’ll want to follow these important takeaways.

• Subject line should answer, “How are you going to help me?”
• Put most important words at beginning of subject line
• Avoid using the same subject line every single time
• Keep subject lines to less than 40 characters
• Avoid using CAPs or exclamation marks
• Don’t use spam trigger words such as: call, free, all new, bargain, guarantee and form

To give you an idea of a good subject line, take a look at the example below.

As you can see from the example, the subject line is short and to the point.  It’s less than 40 characters, which allows it to completely appear on most smartphones. Additionally, the subject line focuses on the reader, not the sender, with the text “You.”

Following these tips will help you develop excellent subject lines for your email newsletters.

3. Format

The format of your newsletters is important.  In order to maximize clicks on content and other items in your newsletter, you’ll want to:

• Keep backgrounds simple

• Make sure your newsletter is readable on different email programs Outlook, Gmail, iPhone email, Android email

• Don’t use too many images

• Keep average newsletter width to about 600 pixels

• Include clickable call to actions that are easy to understand

• Make email easy to scan

• Try to keep text to under 750 words

• Include email opt-out information

To get an idea of what a good email newsletter format should look like, check out the example below.

Working on these three elements of your email newsletters can help to improve opens and clicks. For more great email marketing tips, check out other postings on The No Bull Marketing Blog.