1) Make it punchy

It is important to get your main points across in short statements. Recipients tend to scan through emails and spend less time reading them that a letter. Use lists and bullet points to help with this.

2) Top heavy call-to-actions

The top of the email is by far the most important area. This is the first section recipients will look at. Due to the nature of email encouraging immediate action having your call to actions at the top of the email will help you achieve better results.

For two similar campaigns we have seen the difference in click-thru rates change by six times greater with call-to-actions at the top of the email than the traditional direct mail style.

3) Use Colour

Colour is a great way of breaking up areas of your email to help readers scan and to highlight important information and call-to-actions.

One colour that is not used enough in email is white. White is the best colour for backgrounds as it enables you to read text easily.

4) Tone

Email is a personal conversational medium. To engage effectively with your readers write as you would write a personal letter. This will enable you to create a closer bond with your reader and gain their trust.

5) Realism

Recipients get numerous offers in their inbox each day each claiming to be the answer to all their problems. By the nature of the world we live in consumers are becoming sceptical. Nothing in life is completely free.

Set your readers expectations of your offering to a realistic level and they will be more convinced than if you call everything ‘Free’ or ‘The Best Ever’.

6) Length

Choose an appropriate length for your message. A sales offer or event promotion is best with a short email highlighting the main benefits followed by additional detail on the landing pages.

A newsletter with more informational content would be more suited to a higher proportion of information within the email.

7) Relevance

No-one will spend time reading anything that has no relevance to their needs. Ensure that the copy focuses on issues of interest to your target audience and if necessary send different emails to different segments to achieve this.

8) Personalisation

If you are going to develop a closer relationship with your customers in your copy personalisation is essential. This goes beyond ‘Dear First name’ and should include something that is relevant to the recipient such as a date they last ordered or the name of their account manager as the sign off.

9) Consistency

Newsletters work best when the newsletter is instantly recognisable and the reader is getting what he expects. Don’t chop and change the style of your newsletters. Create a basic template and any new ideas you have should be added to incrementally to achieve consistent emails from month to month.

10) Repetition

In email copy there is little space for you to repeat yourself. However it can help to repeat certain aspects of your copy in key positions. For example the subject line and information in the introduction should be re-enforced in any final call-to-actions you have. Choose only the main key point to repeat in your copy.