What we want to aim for is a consistent flow between the subject line, so people are kind of drawn in by your nice catchy subject line, to the message in the email, and then through to the copy on the landing page or your website. So, we want to have a consistent flow between, so a similar message doesn’t have to be the same message, and it’s probably a good idea not to have exactly the same thing here to here, and then on the landing page. However, a mention of Guardian’s balance on each is probably a good thing to do. So, as an example, we’re looking at this email here. So ‘Say hello to Guardians Balance’ and the email itself ‘Introducing the most innovative balance bike’. So, let’s look and see what does the landing page do? So, let’s go through balance bike. Okay. So, I mean, it’s not an info page giving you the information of the benefits of the balance bike, but it has relevance. So, ‘Say hello to the balance bike’. ‘Introducing the balance bike’. Here’s the balance bike. So, this one does it pretty well. Now let’s take a look at this one. This is another email from Design Modo ‘Introducing blogs: 40 brand-new layouts for blogs and posts’. Ok, that’s the subject line right now. Here we go. So, you have to go down. So, really kind of, you have to scroll down to actually get to the message and the calls to action here. And there’s two calls to action, which is kind of a good strategy to have, you know, one darker and one less dark there. So, it’s a good strategy. It’s a well-designed email. I would probably move that up a little bit. But in terms of consistent flow, ‘Introducing blogs: brand-new layouts for blogs and posts’, ‘Introducing blog posts: 40 brand-new layouts of blogs and posts’. Almost identical. So, they’ve done a pretty good job there. Now let’s have a look at where we’re going to, so if I click on here, you can see that’s a link. Now I’m looking for a similar thing here. So, I’m looking for blogs, brand new layouts of blogs and posts, brand new layouts of blogs and posts. Go in here, take control of your landing page. No mention of brand-new layouts of blogs and posts. Now this could be an old email and the link doesn’t exist anymore, therefore they’re redirecting people here. But if this was the actual email, that’s a faux pas. So, you are talking about something here. You’ve got the message here, and then you’re sending people to here. So, not only is the message completely different, ‘Take control of your landing page’, no mention of 40 brand-new layouts from my blogs and posts. But actually, if you look at the design, it’s not the same, different logo, different brand colours, not very consistent. You could kind of go from here to here and think you’re on a completely different, or they got the link wrong.
So, as I said, you know, they may have updated their website, the brand identity, that page might not exist anymore. But if you look at this as an example, that’s an example of a complete mismatch between the subject line, the heading, and then the actual landing page. So that’s what you don’t want to do. There may be a reason for that, as I said, but that’s what you don’t want to do. What you do want to do is mention, mention and then over to the landing page on the website and mention the same thing again, and have a consistent flow where you’re sending people through. So, there’s a consistency between the subject line, the email heading, and then where you’re sending people to. So people automatically associate each with each. And the key is simplicity. So, to actually have a message that is simple, and have it flow.
