When you consider that between 3 and 4 billion emails are sent and received every single day, making yours stand out in a crowded inbox is always going to be a challenge.

Of course, you're competing with the efforts of other email marketers, but there's also an inbox influx of other attention-grabbing business and personal content to contend with. So you might be forgiven for wondering whether the challenge is even worth it.

Why Bring Your Best Email Game?

The truth is, email marketing is still a growing trend (up another 12% in 2021), and it's still the preferred communication channel of almost half of all consumers.

Done right, email has the potential to generate a much higher marketing return on investment than almost every other channel.

But getting the right kind of clicks can be tricky and time-consuming without the right tools. Hand-coding gets technical very quickly, and it often doesn't leave much room for creativity. All that time spent by marketers and tech support ironing out technical quirks could be better spent on the creation of more delightful, engaging, and persuasive email content.

Seven Ways to Elevate Your Emails

This article covers seven of the tips and tricks highlighted in Knak's definitive guide to creating kick-ass emails, which provides a more in-depth overview of what it takes to wow your mailing list (it's not just about having a snazzy subject line).

Get your first impressions right

Make them count. Your email is a book that' about to get judged by its cover, and you've got about 10 seconds to win over potential readers. Consider what they see first, and how you need to make that as appealing, engaging, and as effortless for them as possible.

Think of all the reasons they have not to click open or continue reading your email (time, interest, relevance) then give them a reason to stay. (It's a bit like speed dating!)

Write compelling email copy

Hurrah! You've successfully stalled your reader (by a matter of seconds) from deleting your content. Now it's ready for a skim or scan. Either something specific has got their attention, and they're going to scan for it, or they're mildly curious by your messaging, and they're all set to give it a skim read.

That's right, all that carefully crafted copy is going to get a once over at speed. For your words to work their magic, you're going to need copy that's light and lucid. (Our guide has much more on this topic.)

Focus on design and layout

Here's a thought: Is reading all about the words? What about the spaces in-between? Would your email copy get the same, less, or more readers if it looked a little different? (A/B testing can help answer those questions, by the way.)

Email is a calculated collision of creative copy and complimentary design and layout. Trial and error can work wonders, but with a no-code drag and drop email builder there's a whole host of design hacks you can more quickly deploy to make a powerful impact.

Call your readers to action

Without a CTA, all your creative efforts will come to nothing. The CTA is the reason for writing your email in the first place. It's not an afterthought or a convenient way to round things up. It should be there from the start and there at the end, as well as somewhere in between.

If your reader has got as far as opening your offering, the least you can do is give them every opportunity to connect with their onward journey—ideally an equally well-designed landing page.

Incorporate responsive elements

With so many screen sizes, devices, and reading experiences available to email readers, it's important to give them the same optimal experience everywhere. Losing readers due to a poorly optimized reading experience is a bit like turning customers away before they've even had a chance to get through the door.

Responsive emails look good on any display, but they're tricky to get right without the right guidance. (P.S. We have that guidance in our guide.)

Make emails accessible

If responsive email lets your readers through the door, accessibility features take your messaging to the broadest possible audience once they're inside. Like any other on-screen text, with the right considerations your email can be easily accessed by everyone. Without accessibility features, you automatically lose a percentage of your intended audience.

Keep things dynamic

One surefire way to differentiate your email from all the others racking up in inboxes around the world is to do something a little different. The right email creation platform can help you deliver fresh and interactive design elements while keeping within the boundaries of the available bandwidth. Dynamic content is an important part of the future for email marketers.

More Guidance on Writing Better Emails

To coax that hovering mouse pointer away from the garbage can pictogram and onto the subject line, email marketers need to carefully consider every component of their latest email effort—or they can kiss goodbye to comfortable click rates.

But rather than endless hours of intensive labor, email creation should be a labor of love. And it can be, when you take back creative control with modular, easy-to-integrate, no-code email creation.

See what you can do with the right email builder, read our guide and create kick-ass emails.