If you’ve studied marketing and growing a small business then you know one of the most important aspects of your business is your email subscriber list. Instagram, Facebook, Twitter can all be gone tomorrow then you’d be left with no way to reach out to potential or past clients. Your email subscriber list is something you own. However, just because you have a large (or small), email subscriber list doesn’t guarantee they are opening or reading it. I’ve put together a few simple tips that will help improve your email newsletters content and design.

Simple Tips to Improve Your Email Newsletter

You need to be sending out a newsletter as soon as you have one subscriber.

When I first started growing my newsletter subscriber list my first subscribers were my mom and dad…pretty exciting, right? However, I still sent out a newsletter! Not only because I knew my parents loved receiving it because I am their child, and they’re proud of me, but because I needed the experience to refine the craft. Once you start sending them out regularly, you’ll be glad only a few people saw how terrible your first one was.

Make it routine.

People need to expect to receive your newsletter. If you have a blog, you can send out at the end of the month a round-up of your most-read blog posts. After a while, your subscribers will come to expect that newsletter to make sure they didn’t miss any of your updates. I send out a newsletter monthly. However, if I have a lot of exciting things happening like brand launches, I’ll send them out more frequently.

Subject Lines

Keep your subject line under 30 characters.

When writing your subject line, you just want to hook people, so they want to open it. My highest percentage open-rate was 92%, and the subject line for that campaign was ‘We’ve Launched’. My readers wanted to know more – what did she launch? Will I be missing out on something important if I don’t open this to see? Get your readers to want to know more by using the subject line. Think about the subject line as the gift wrapping to a present.

Avoid using spammy words in the subject line.

Words like ‘Click’, ‘Buy’, ‘Open’, ‘Discount’, or ‘100% Free’ (See the full list here) not only sound spammy and completely amateur but they may also trigger spam filters, and your newsletter will end up in the Spam Folder.

Try using A/B Testing.

When first starting out you may want to try A/B Tests of your subject line. This will send out the same newsletter with different subject line sayings. You can use this information about the different open-rates to get a feel for what your audiences response.

Content

Add a personal touch.

People want to feel a connection with you. Give them a way to get to know more about you and your process. This doesn’t have to be in every newsletter. You can give readers a behind-the-scenes look or a special sneak-peak preview people who don’t subscribe don’t get to see.

Free, Free, Free, Sell.

A good rule of thumb is 90% free content, 10% paid content. I give away a ton of free content in my newsletter because I like to add value and show my subscribers my knowledge. Sometimes I give away something as simple as a free iPhone wallpaper, or sometimes it’s a free mini-guide. However, when I sell – it’s apparent. I don’t meekly sell; the entire newsletter will be just that – me, selling. This principal is based on Gary Vaynerchuk’s book, Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook, which I recommend. You will get unsubscribes when you do send out a newsletter selling, but that is perfectly fine. They weren’t your target audience anyways. Don’t take unsubscribers personally.

Design

Keep it in line with your brand.

This may be a no-brainer, but I’ll say it (type it) anyways. Your newsletter needs to follow your brand style. Even if you buy an email newsletter template, you can customize it.

Don’t add too many call-to-action buttons.

I learned this the hard way. My highest click-rate was a campaign that one call-to-action button. My lowest click-rate was for a campaign that had five call-to-action buttons. Asking your readers to do too many things confuses them. They don’t know what to do, so in return do none. Or they may, if you’re lucky, complete one call-to-action but not return to the email to do any of the others. I try to keep my call-to-action to one, maybe two buttons or links.

If you apply these simple tips, you’ll see your open and click rates both improve. Get these tips plus more or if you’d prefer to listen to this post, rather than read it, you can listen.