The Dissection of a Bloody Good Email Newsletter

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2015 Update: One of our most popular posts on newsletters, this article now includes some updated examples to fuel your inspiration. This article was originally published in 2013.

Are you familiar with the old school Milton Bradley game, Operation? It tests your ability to remove ailments (like a broken heart) from a patient using a pair of tweezers connected to a wire. If you aren’t precise enough in removing the ailment, BUZZ! the alarm sounds, the patient’s bright red nose lights up, and you’ve lost your turn.

Anatomy, deriving from the Greek translation, “I cut up, cut open,” and the ability to piece together or dissect things carefully is also a test to your email marketing skills. Concoct an engaging email newsletter with all of the right parts and you win; otherwise, you risk losing a turn, or worse, readers. So what makes up the anatomy of a bloody good email newsletter? Let’s operate:

1. Intriguing Subject Line & Pre-header – Just like the smell of sweet apple pie, your subject line needs to lure readers in with its potency. Avoid generic subject lines like: “This Month’s Newsletter, Newsletter #3, Upcoming Events” etc. because these subject lines don’t entice, incentivize an open, or give readers any clue about what’s actually in your newsletter. Get creative, albania whatsapp number database have fun, try new things and test out a bunch of different subject lines. Treat your pre-header as a secondary subject line and include even more info about what goodies are awaiting readers inside. Remove carefully: Your company name from the subject line – This is what the “from label” is for; otherwise it’s taking up valuable open-inducing space.

Here are a few recent retail subject line examples:



2. Masthead/logo (linked) – Have a specific logo for your newsletter, give it a fun name like, “The Irresistible Insider,” include a masthead and/or your company logo and always remember to link it! You’re giving customers tons of valuable content, so give them a path back to your site, especially if they want to sign up and/or spend. Remove carefully: Unnecessary space – You want to include a masthead and logo, but if it’s too large, you’re pushing juicy content below the fold. Here’s an example of an effective email newsletter masthead from the California Academy of Sciences.





3. Table of Contents – You only have 51 seconds (the average amount of time someone spends on an email newsletter) to grab your reader’s attention. If they do not know immediately what’s in store for them, he/she won’t be bothered to scroll past the top fold. We’ve tested this in our very own VR Buzz only to discover that when a table of contents is included, readers chose to read which content interests them the most versus what we place at the top, resulting in more clicks, especially on content found near the bottom.