Email Best Practices
Consider the medium.
Is email the best way to reach your audience with your message? If you’re not sure, here are some questions to ask yourself. Do I want my audience to respond digitally? Is my audience already inundated with email from BJU? Does my audience have email and do they check it frequently? Would my message be better delivered through another medium such as a phone call or a physical mailing?
Consider the users.
Most people today (especially students) are flooded with email. Your message must be strong and compelling for it to stand a chance of even being opened. Although it varies based on audience size and relevancy, typical email open rates can be below 10% and click-through rates are even lower. Many people check their email on-the-go. Over 50% of email opens happen on mobile devices—that’s the majority of email usage. If users are not willing to engage with your email in a mobile setting, your engagement will suffer further.
Consider your content.
Knowing the ins-and-outs of the email medium and your users should inform the makeup of your email messaging. The best emails are short and succinct: one paragraph of text, one call to action. Keep it brief. People tend to scan emails very quickly. Simplify your wording as much as possible and further clarify your main points with headings and bullets if need be. Do not use any more images than are absolutely necessary to convey your message. Have one (only one, and always one) call to action. If you overwhelm users by asking them to click multiple links or perform multiple actions, the likelihood that they will even complete one of those tasks diminishes. On the other hand, if your email has no main action item associated with it, you probably shouldn’t be sending it in the first place.
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