Matthew Montoya, Constant Contact’s Senior Channel Marketing and Enablement Manager, recently joined MailCon for the webinar “Overcoming Brand Consistency Challenges in Email Marketing.”
Montoya’s dynamic knowledge and excitement for the topic of consistent branding shined through his speech as he detailed different ways to tackle branding inconsistencies, all while offering alternative solutions to these email marketing campaign issues.
Here’s a breakdown of the insights he shared with MailCon.
What Secures a Consistent Brand Presence in the Inbox?
To truly identify the makings of a fabulous brand presence, we must first understand what a brand is. It’s the collective impact or lasting impression from everything seen, heard, or experienced by customers throughout all the touchpoints they have with a company, its products, or services.
When it comes to reinforcing and protecting a brand’s identity while sending email marketing campaigns to prospects and other segmented stakeholders, it’s imperative that the email structure is made up of the following elements consistent with the brand’s identity across its website and other marketing channels and elements. Here are the makings of an optimal email design:
- Logo and brand color
- Text
- Calls to action
- Images and graphics
Managing a Company’s Branding and Messaging: Things that Can Go Wrong
Most people don’t realize that a large percentage of daily email campaigns from businesses aren’t created by actual marketers but rather business owners who are trying to make the best of their resources.
A lack of specialty in email marketing often causes faulty email makeup, lost brand consistency, and a deviation from best practices. The following are some common issues seen in email marketing today:
- Inability to measure campaign success
- Lack of adherence to branding guidelines
- No top-level control
- Lack of connection to your brand as the customer knows it
- Lack of relevancy as a result
Fixing Branding Problems
When fixing branding issues caused by inconsistency, one must never forget the importance of “relevance.” When a consumer receives an email with the design and content that automatically connects the message to a brand, they are more likely to click through the CTAs of an email.
Consider the following branding elements as the four central pillars of a great and consistent email campaign:
Logo and Brand Color
- Keep the logo at the top center or the top left corner
- Use company colors consistently throughout the email, the way you would do throughout your website or in promotional materials
- Lock your logo in the same spot for any given campaign to further develop consistency in your email makeup
Text & Content
- Only use universal fonts
- Headlines should be 21pt
- Body text should be 14pt
Calls to Action
- Do not include more than three CTAs
- Create and link buttons and images to the exact web location with all calls to action
Images
- Use images to support the primary call to action
- Only use brand approved or custom graphics
- Do not use more than three images in one email
Best Practices and Final Tips
Email affects businesses and entities of all types, from bakeries to churches to enterprise businesses — so keeping everything consistent with company and entity branding will give anyone a massive advantage in open rates, engagements, click-through rates, and conversions.
When looking to up your game in email branding, never forget that most of your audience is opening your emails on their mobile devices, which also means that your time with them is limited.
Creating catchy headlines staying true to brand colors, themes, messaging, and visuals will instantly help clients relate to your message quicker.
Start the process with good content, then identify the assets that will support your message and call to action. Make sure that everything you send has a clear message.
Lastly, if your company uses multiple email marketing accounts for each client segment, make sure that you offer a “global unsubscribe” option to allow the recipient to opt-out from unwanted communications from your group of brands.
Lastly, never lose sight of the power that good branding holds in any given email marketing campaign’s success.
What are your best practices for brand consistency in email?
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