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Email Articles & Videos

  • Email Newsletters Pick Up Where Websites Leave Off

    Users have highly emotional reactions to newsletters which feel much more personal than websites. In usability testing, success rates were high for subscribe and unsubscribe tasks, but users were frustrated by newsletters that demanded too much of their time.

  • Protecting the User's Mailbox

    Email is a powerful way to reach customers, but overdoing it is risky. Let users know up front that you'll respect their mailboxes. Otherwise, they won't give their email addresses, and you'll lose a unique channel for marketing and customer service.

  • Mailing List Usability

    Mailing list content must be ultra-short. Provide separate email addresses for subscribing and unsubscribing and include info on how to get off in every mailing list message. Improved usability increased subscriptions by 128% in one case study.

  • Reputation Managers are Happening

    Epinions and Google join eBay in maintaining independent ratings of the quality of products, websites, and auction sellers, leading to better customer service and helping users make informed buying decisions.

  • 3 UX Tips for Better Newsletters and Marketing Emails

    Your customers want email newsletters that provide immediate utility. Thoughtful layout, image choices, and formatting will help you win over subscribers on your mailing list.

  • Emojis in Email Subject Lines: Advantage or Impediment? đź‘Ť đź‘Ž

    Our research shows that emojis in subject lines increase negative sentiment toward an email and do not increase the likelihood of an email being opened.

  • Communicating Changes Throughout the Buyer's Journey: A COVID-19 Case Study

    When emergency situations impact retail operations, stores must inform customers of resulting changes to services with salient communications across all channels.

  • Animated GIFs in Email Are Worse Than Static Emails

    On average, people have a more positive reaction to emails without animated GIFs compared to those with animated GIFs.

  • Status Trackers and Progress Updates: 16 Design Guidelines

    Status trackers are pull; progress updates are push. Both are used to track the delivery of a product or service. When they work together effectively, users are informed and in control.

  • The State of Transactional Email

    Automated email messages are more usable than they used to be. Good transactional email should be concise, clear, and easy for users to process.

  • Top 10 Design Mistakes in the Unsubscribe Experience

    Canceling email subscriptions should be a one-click process, with no additional hurdles for users.

  • Imagery in Newsletters: Make Your Marketing Emails Visual But Don’t Sacrifice Usability

    Newsletter recipients expect high-quality images, but excessive focus on graphic design can result in emails that are illegible, unusable, and can’t deliver on business goals.

  • Marketing Email and Newsletters: UX Findings Then and Now

    New research finds big changes in newsletter design and in customers’ attitudes toward marketing email.

  • Email Subject Lines: 5 Tips to Attract Readers

    Focus on the first 40 characters. Descriptive and well-written subject lines allow recipients to make an informed decision to get more details or move on.

  • Mobile Email Newsletters

    Mobile use strengthens email marketing's benefits by offering ubiquitous newsletter access, but it also introduces new usability limitations for template design.

  • E-Mail Newsletters: Increasing Usability

    New research finds improved usability metrics for subscribing to newsletters, but problems with reading them on mobile devices.

  • UK Election Email Newsletters Rated

    The main British parties' email newsletters have higher usability scores than we found for US political newsletters in our last evaluation.

  • E-Mailing Press Releases to Journalists

    3 design guidelines for sending press releases to journalists by email.

  • Transactional Email and Confirmation Messages

    Automated email can improve customer service, strengthen relationships, and help websites bypass search engines. But most messages fared poorly in user testing and didn't fulfill this potential.

  • Email Newsletters: Surviving Inbox Congestion

    Newsletter usability has increased since our last study, but the competition for users' attention has also grown with the ever-increasing glut of information.

  • Incompetent Email Marketing = Lost Future Opportunities

    Lack of personalization made an email newsletter completely useless to the recipient, damaging long-term customer relationship efforts.

  • Newsletter Usability: Can a Professional Publisher Do Better?

    The Washington Post's email newsletter earns a high usability score. It's particularly good at setting users' expectations before they subscribe, though the unsubscribe interface has some problems.

  • Bush vs. Kerry: Email Newsletters Rated

    Both candidates for president of the United States offer email newsletters with much good content to excite supporters, but miserable subscription interfaces and several other usability problems.

  • Targeted Email Newsletters Show Continued Strength

    E-newsletters that are informative, convenient, and timely are often preferred over other media. However, a new study found that only 11% of newsletters were read thoroughly, so layout and content scannability are paramount.

  • Email Newsletters Pick Up Where Websites Leave Off

    Users have highly emotional reactions to newsletters which feel much more personal than websites. In usability testing, success rates were high for subscribe and unsubscribe tasks, but users were frustrated by newsletters that demanded too much of their time.