9 marketing roles for your email words to play

I love you.

It’s a boy!

Ich bin ein Berliner.

Outlook 2007.

Given the right situation, all those words are capable of provoking an emotional response the equal of any image.

A picture may indeed be worth a thousand words, but not if you hire a good writer.

Yet words are often an afterthought in email marketing.

We fuss about who to send email to, how to send it, when to send it, what design and structure to use, what it is we want to say, but…how we say it gets less attention.

Yet without the right words, your email is a bottle without a message, doomed to float unregarded on the online ocean.

Let’s redress the balance over the coming weeks with the occasional article on the power of text…beginning with a personal overview of the different roles words can and/or should fulfil in a marketing email.

I’ve split them into three categories:

• Engage the reader’s attention and guide them toward action
• Drive a specific response
• Provide functional support

The below list should serve as a reminder of the greater time investment your words deserve.

Engage and guide

1. Attention, interest, engagement

The first role is to draw attention to your email in the inbox, engage the interest of the viewer and draw them into taking a closer look at your message.

The main responsibility for this rests with the from line, subject line and text in the preheader or preview pane area.

Combined, they ensure the email is recognized and communicate the value of the message to the recipient.

It’s not just about winning attention and interest, but winning attention and interest from the people who are most likely to take the action you want them to.

2. Guidance

The second role is to combine with non-text elements to guide the reader through the email so the important parts of the message are easy to find and grasp.

This involves appropriate use of:

• headlines
• bullet points
• text highlighting (bold, italics, colors, fonts and font sizes)
• paragraph lengths and widths
• white space and text positioning

3. Preparing the response

The third role is to persuade the reader to respond. Here a “response” is not just a physical action (click), but also a mental one (like developing an opinion – see Role 7).

Equally important, it’s not just about the first response (e.g. a click), but encouraging an intention beyond that initial response (e.g. a click followed by a purchase).

This is what we traditionally consider the art and science of copywriting.

Drive a response

4. Primary call-to-action

The fourth role is to provide an outlet for making that response (where relevant).

This is the primary CTA: the link(s) you want people to click on to reach the main product, service or content offered in the email.

It begins with the words you use to tell people what to do and why (e.g. “shop now” or “click here to download the white paper” or “click to get 20% off winter fashions”).

But it also involves decisions about the number of CTAs and their position relative to other email content.

The CTA “container” is also important. Do you use just text, text on a button or text/image combinations? Which colors, shapes, sizes and fonts are best?

5. Secondary CTAs

The fifth role is to give readers an outlet for other actions and responses beyond the main goal of the email.

An obvious example is links to other products, services or content.

The challenge is to give those not interested in the main CTA some other way to engage with and respond to your email, but without distracting from the core purpose of the message.

Other examples of secondary CTAs include:

• Forward-to-a-friend (FTF) links
• Share-with-your-network (SWYN) links
• Links allowing interaction through other channels (e.g. “follow us on Twitter”)
• Website navigational links, leading to important areas of the website, such as search forms, content categories or product groups

6. Tertiary CTAs

The sixth role is to provide an outlet for those clicking on parts of the email that are not active calls to action.

We know, for example, that people will click on headlines, product and service names (and images), so we can choose which additional text elements also need to be links.

7. Brand experience

The seventh role is to create an experience or impression that mirrors and reinforces the brand or image of the sender.

Even where the primary goal of the text is to drive people toward a specific physical action (mostly a click), the words you use make and leave an impression.

This concerns the style, tone and personality of the words and language used.

Functional support

8. Fallback words

The eighth role is supporting the message when problems arise. Consider, for example, when images are blocked or the HTML is garbled by the recipient’s email software.

There are two sides to this.

The first is proividing direct fallback for broken images and designs, through links to online or mobile versions of the message, creative use of alt attributes or possibly short text labels under images.

The second is ensuring the headlines and other text used in the mail communicate a clear message even when images are not visible.

9. Administrative words

The ninth role is to fulfil administrative, legal and other support functions, such as:

• “Add to address list” requests
• The copyright notice
• Sender details (address and possibly other business details, like company registration numbers). These reflect legal requirements, but also a need to establish transparency and credibility
• Unsubscribe and subscription management links
• Permission reminders
• Advance notice of future emails
• Sign-up links

Of course, much of the above can rely equally on images and other design elements. Even plain text messages use long combinations of letters and symbols to create graphic-like elements to give the message structure and guide the reader.

Neither are these roles necessarily mutually exclusive. The way you write your administrative blurb, for example, also reflects on your brand and image.

So, there are a few ideas of what we need to think about with our text. More details on some of those roles to come in future posts…

Find related articles:

• Channel: Copywriting

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