# **Strategies for Writing Emails That Get Delivered and Engaged With**

An email inbox is probably one of the most competitive places in the world. Millions of brands and businesses send out emails to their customers, hoping to catch their attention. In fact, a staggering 347.3 billion emails are sent globally every day. With that huge number, just how do you stand out?

The key is to write eye-catching and engaging emails. Sounds easier said than done, right? But there are multiple strategies that you can use to improve the quality and effectiveness of your emails. We’ll walk you through the whole process, from crafting your subject line to your follow-up emails.

Let’s dive in!

# **8 Strategies to Write Engaging and Effective Emails**

**Write great subject lines**

Think of your subject lines as your headline. If it isn’t compelling or interesting enough, no one would actually want to learn more.

Of course, this doesn’t mean doing click-bait type of headlines. Making false promises or giving misleading information will just send you directly to spam, or worse, have your recipient unsubscribe.

A great subject line is something that is clear, direct, and eye-catching. It should give you an idea on what the email is about, yet still provide enough mystery to hook you in to reading more. For instance, “Want to grow your prospect list by 50%?” is a good subject line, since it clearly tells you what the email is about but doesn’t give away the answer immediately.

Here are some more tips on how to nail your subject line:

**The shorter the better** - According to Marketo, the optimal length for subject lines is 7 words or 41 characters. Also, mobile phones can only show 25-30 characters for their subject line, so consider that as well.

**Play around with emojis** - Adding a few well-placed ❤️ or 👉 is a great way to get your message across while keeping your subject line brief. Brands also saw a [29%](https://https://medium.com/swlh/should-you-use-emojis-in-your-email-subject-lines) increase in their open rate and a 28% increase in CTR when using emojis.

**Use numbers** - Emails with numbers in their subject lines have [57%](https://https://www.zippia.com/advice/email-subject-line-statistics/) better open rates. This is because numbers tend to draw our eyes, and make your emails look more legitimate and actionable.

**Avoid looking spammy** - Steer clear from phrases like “Money back”, “Earn $”, “No hidden cost” and the like. Also avoid using all-caps and extreme punctuation marks, like “FREE!!!!!!”, as these tend to trigger spam filters and banish your email to the Spam folder.

**Optimize your preview text**

Your preview text is your subject line’s partner. They need to work hand-in-hand to properly get your email’s message to your audience.

However, this doesn’t mean they should say the same thing twice. Your preview text’s job is to build upon your subject line, add more information, or further entice your audience.

For instance, if your subject line is “50% off on new arrivals!”, your preview text should explain what those items are, so it would be something like “New trousers and linen pants are waiting for you”. Don’t do a preview text of “Get 50% off on our new items”, since you just said the same thing as your subject line, or “Lots of great deals on our site!” since it doesn’t really give more info to your audience.

Your preview text can be around 40 to 140 characters. However, the range of text that can be displayed will vary depending on the device and the email provider your audience uses. To make sure that your text is readable to the majority of your audience, aim for around 50 to 90 characters.

Another important thing to remember is that your subject line and preview text is sometimes displayed right next to each other (an example is Gmail on desktop). So if your subject line is long, your preview text should be shorter so that both can be displayed properly, and vice versa.

**Write better**

This may seem like a bit of obvious advice, but writing better emails is the key to getting your audience engaged.

But how exactly do you write engaging emails? Here are some best practices:

* **Write simply and concisely** - No one is clicking emails to read long paragraphs of text. Write short sentences, and make sure to keep your messages brief. Avoid jargon, market speak, or complicated words.

* **Follow a logical pattern** - An email is composed of a greeting, opening line, main content, CTA, then closing line. Following this common pattern instead of deviating from it will make your emails easier to read.

* **Think about your tone** - The tone you use on your emails should depend on your audience as well as your brand. Are you talking to B2B businesses? Then your email tone should be more professional and authoritative. Are you talking to a younger audience? Then a more informal and casual tone will work better.

* **Have a goal for the email** - Having a clear purpose for your email will help you write it better since you’ll have a clearer idea on how to achieve it. How do you want your audience to feel when they read your message? What action do you want them to take? Having clear goals will make it easier for you to write since you know what goal you want to achieve, and consequently, your emails will also be easier to understand for your audience.

* **Stick to one purpose for the email** - Speaking of goals, make sure your email only has one goal or purpose for it. If your email needs your audience to take multiple actions, it’s going to be confusing for them. For example, do you have a clearance sale for all your items? Make sure your email only talks about that, and don’t include that you have a new membership plan available. Instead, write a separate email about that.

* **Provide useful content** - Your audience wants content that is valuable and relevant to them. While discounts and sales are great, providing educational content and useful advice is also welcome. Let’s say that you are a grocery store. Your audience will appreciate it if you provide food storage tips and nutritional facts about food items. You can also provide timely content like links to Thanksgiving recipes or “Best Chocolate For Valentines” to make your content more engaging.

**Think about the graphics**

Email is not just about the words you use. The graphics that you use along with it is just as important, and can affect the success of your email marketing.

In fact, emails that include graphics have a higher [30%](https://https://www.getresponse.com/resources/reports/email-marketing-benchmarks) open rate and 3% CTR rate compared to only 22% open rate and 1% CTR rate of text-based emails.

Beautiful graphics are crucial in catching your audience’s eye and making them more engaged with your email. It can also be used to break up your text, so that it's easier to read and digest. You can also use videos or infographics as an alternative way to make your idea easier to understand for visual learners.

Interactive content, like carousel, rollovers, hover effects, and gamification elements can also be added to your emails. These type of content boost engagement according to 66% of marketers.

Your visual branding also plays a huge role. Your emails should use your brand’s color scheme, typography, art style, photography aesthetic, etc. Aside from being visually appealing, it helps solidify your brand identity to your audience if you have a consistent style on your emails.

Don’t forget to stamp your logo on your emails as well, as it is your main branding asset. Check out [logo maker](https://www.brandcrowd.com/logo-maker) tools online if you don’t have a logo yet.

**Make sure you're sending to correct emails**

Bounced emails, undelivered emails — these are probably every email marketers worst nightmare. To make sure you are successfully delivering your messages to the correct inbox, use email verifier tools online. Such tools can help you clean your email list by removing invalid emails and verifying if the emails you have are active or breached/unsafe.

If you are doing some cold email marketing, you can also benefit from using email finder tools. These can help you in finding emails of your prospects, as well as verifying if the email address is indeed correct.

**Don’t get marked as spam**

There’s nothing more frustrating than crafting a perfect email only to have it be sent to the Spam folder. While spam filters are smart and adept at catching spammers, you might get accidentally tagged as spam (or worse, you annoy your audience enough that they mark you as Spam).

So how do you avoid it? Here are some quick tips:

* **Stay on top of your list** - When you send emails to invalid addresses, your email service provider will assume that you are not a legitimate sender and will automatically mark you as spam. Use your email verification tools from the previous step to routinely check the validity of your email list.

* **Ask your audience’s consent** - Only send emails to audiences that are subscribed to your list. Or give them an option to unsubscribe or opt-out from future emails. This will decrease the chance of you getting marked as spam by a disgruntled audience.

* **Don’t send too many emails** - Even if they want to receive your emails, if you send a total of 10 emails in an hour your audience will absolutely not be happy with you. Make sure that you send a reasonable amount of emails at well-paced intervals.

* **Be honest**- Sometimes, it really is just as simple as that. Don’t include misleading content, clearly mark your promotional content as ads, use a valid domain name, and include your valid physical postal address. These are all needed to authenticate your emails.

**Send follow-up emails**

With thousands of emails pouring in every day, it’s easy to get your message lost. Sending a few gentle reminders and well-timed follow-up emails might be just what you need.

Of course, context will matter for your follow-up emails.

Are you doing cold-emailing? Your follow-up email should be sent after at least 3 days. Make sure to attach your previous email, and add some context again so that your recipient knows what you're talking about. You should also include a short info of the value you can provide to them.

If you are an e-commerce site, you can also send out follow-up emails. This can be in the form of abandoned cart emails, where you send a reminder to your audience that they still haven’t checked out their item. You can also send out prompts if stock is running out, if their subscription is expiring, if there is a free shipping deal right now, etc.

Other websites can send out follow-up emails as well, be it to remind your audience that you have a webinar, there is an event they have to sign-up for, if there are ticket sales, etc.

Whatever the nature of your business is, sending out a polite follow-up email can help in the success of your email marketing.

**Wrapping Up**

Writing the perfect email is both art and science. It should have a blend of great written content and stunning visuals, plus boosted with various email tools. With the tips above, you should be on your way to crafting an engaging and effective email that can help jumpstart your business.

**Author’s Bio**

Janella Malapad is an outreach specialist at [DesignCrowd](https://www.designcrowd.com/). She spends her free time playing volleyball on the court, carrying enthusiasm, and embracing the love of the sport when she's not lost in the captivating landscapes of poetry. You can reach her through [Linkedin](https://www.linkedin.com/in/janella-malapad-ba60a4204/) or her email [e-mail]