I recently watched a YouTube video titled “5 ways to annoy a millennial through email marketing” the video is embedded below but please don’t watch the pretty pictures before finishing the blog, I promise I make some valid points. My first valid points is millennials, you’re nothing special, these 5 things annoy EVERYONE!
Point 1. Text in emails – it’s a valid point, no one wants to read email text, they want to scan and see something that piques their interest then click or tap for more detail. However, more importantly, you want them to see something they like and click or tap because they can’t do the thing you want them to in their email client. You want them back in your environment. In the off-line world you want them in your store not looking in the window. On-line it’s the same, you want them site-side not in the email client.
Point 2. Corporate message – it’s a valid point, no one wants to hear from your CEO. As marketers we know that the CEO thinks it’s important to give the “company story” but in truth, no one cares, and they certainly don’t care in their private space, their email client or their smart phone. Keep the message from your CEO for your corporate investment brochure, for some hidden about us page on your website or better still lose it completely.
Point 3. Stock photos – it’s a valid point, using 1980’s stock images is amateur in the extreme and there is no need for it. Allow me to let you into a secret, there are lots of places on the internet to find cool, funky stock images. Instagram, Google image search or go ask your design team, they will have somewhere they already go for their fun stuff. For a bit of fun here are some of the more bizarre stock photos that you really shouldn’t use.
Point 4. Unsubscribe – it’s a valid point, someone wants to get off your merry-go-round, let them. Make it easy, it’s the law as well as good practice, nuff said! That was for the millennials, for the rest of us, enough said!
Point 5. Responsive – it’s a valid point, responsive email should be the norm, the whole world has a smart phone, the whole world uses it to check email, we recently did a talk on “the opportunity cost of designing with crayons” which covers of the who, what, when, why and how to do responsive email. It isn’t just the millennials who want to be able to read and interact with your emails on their device.