How to Craft Flawless Email Templates

With more than 4.4 billion internet users worldwide in 2023, your small business must use email communication to connect with potential customers and engage with longer-term buyers. Email templates can streamline communication efforts by giving you trusted, tested starting points to build.

If your small business isn’t already using templates to draft and execute your email marketing campaigns, may I ask why not? You’re only wasting time you could save and spend on other areas of your marketing or business.

Allow me to introduce you to email templates in full. In this blog post, I’ll review the types of email templates you can select from, and provide customization tips and implementation strategies.

Table of Contents

Key Takeaways

Email templates are highly beneficial for small businesses, as they save time, streamline email marketing, and promote consistency in building your brand.
Prioritizing email template creation and implementation will ensure a smoother implementation process that can begin delivering usable results sooner.

The Role of Email Templates in Business Communication

There are so many contexts in which email templates are useful, from internal communications to external marketing and customer service.

Still unsure? Then, review this list of benefits to determine why email templates matter so much in small business communication.

Consistency

Using email templates produces a reliable layout. Your audience will become accustomed to a high caliber of your email content, which you can maintain without working as hard as you would if you forewent a template.

Time savings

You can easily spend hours designing one email. If your next message has a different style, you lose hours more.

Even if you modify your email template, having the skeleton of your email already done, so to speak, will result in amazing time savings.

As a small business owner wearing many hats, you need as much time as possible so you don’t stretch yourself too thin, and templates will help.

Brand reinforcement

Another element of a more consistent email design is branding. Regularity is key in developing a memorable brand, a task you’re still working on as a small business.

When sending your emails, you can create brand reinforcement sooner by sticking to the same design parameters.

Better productivity

How many of your team members are working on email marketing?

Since you probably have a small crew as a startup, these employees likely have other tasks besides emails. The sooner they can check off the task of email design from their workload, the faster they can get to those other assignments.

Ultimately, this leads to more productivity and shorter task completion times.

More personalization

You might assume that email templates would result in less personalization, but it’s more.

You can create templates for each of your customer avatars and tailor the content according to audience data from your latest campaign.

Better customer satisfaction

Personalized, regularly engaging emails will connect more strongly with your audience.

Your emails have achieved objectives with reliably high open and click-through rates for your campaigns.

The Different Types of Email Templates

Have I inspired you to explore the varied world of email templates yet? Let’s see how varied it is by reviewing the types you can choose for your next campaign.

Welcome emails

A welcome email is the first message a customer receives after subscribing to your email list, so it has to be good. This automated email should go out shortly after the lead joins and is the first step toward guiding them through the sales funnel.

Welcome emails needn’t be long.

A brief paragraph should suffice, maybe two paragraphs if you offer an exclusive discount code.

Here’s a sample welcome email template:

Welcome to our community! We’re thrilled to have you join us and look forward to sharing valuable updates, exclusive offers, and exciting news with you. By subscribing to our emails, you’ve taken the first step toward staying connected with [company name]. We’ve got you covered whether you’re interested in our latest products, upcoming events, or helpful tips and resources.

If you have any questions or feedback, please don’t hesitate to contact us. We love hearing from our subscribers and are always here to help.

Transactional emails

One of the most frequent types of emails you’ll send is transactional. These emails include order confirmations, shipping notifications, and receipts.

Again, there’s no need for this email to drone on. Provide the order information, and that’s about it. Here’s an example:

Dear [customer name],

Thank you for purchasing [product/service name] from [your company name]. This email acts as your order confirmation. Below is a summary of your order:

If you have any questions or concerns about your order, please don’t hesitate to contact our customer service team at [email] or [phone number]. We’re happy to assist in any way we can.

Promotional emails

Once you convert leads, you’ll regularly send promotional emails to encourage more of their business.

You’ll use promotional emails when debuting a new product or service, during seasonal sales, when discounting holiday stock, or when you feel like throwing your customers a bone.

Here’s what a promotional email might look like.

For a limited time, we offer free shipping on all orders. This is our way of saying thank you for your continued support and loyalty.

Use the promo code [your code] at checkout to redeem this offer. But hurry, this offer expires on [date], so get it before it’s gone!

Newsletter templates

You might send monthly, bimonthly, or quarterly newsletter content to inform your audience of what’s happening with your small business and share news, trends, and insights from your industry.

Newsletters have more advanced layouts that require hours in your email template tool. However, the time you take to build the newsletter now will pay back dividends every time you send one.

Customer service responses

Email templates are ultra-valuable for customer service responses. You can train your employees to handle customer requests, questions, and complaints using canned responses modified to fit a specific situation.

For example, here’s a template you can use.

Dear [customer name],

Thank you for reaching out to [company name]! We appreciate the opportunity to assist you with your inquiry.

Our team is reviewing your inquiry and will respond as soon as possible.

In the meantime, if you have any additional information or details you would like to provide, please feel free to reply to this email, and we will consider them when addressing your concern.

We understand your inquiry is important and are committed to providing you with a prompt and helpful response. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Thank you for choosing [company name]!

Internal communications

The last type of email template is internal communications among your team, including cultural communications, employee surveys, crisis communication (you hope it will never happen, but it could), information, internal podcasts, campaign communication, and employee newsletters).

Since the nature of internal communications varies so much, you’ll likely create several templates you’ll use according to the nature of the email.

How to Create Effective Email Templates

The above template examples show you what you could do; you’re not restricted to only those options. You should create email templates that reflect your brand voice, values, and needs.

Here are some instructions on how to get started.

Step 1: Choose the right platform and tools

There are many tools for building email templates, from custom HTML editors to platforms like Constant Contact and MailChimp.

EngageBay, an all-in-one CRM for startups and small businesses, has more than 1,000 free HTML email templates from which to select.

The templates include industries such as home furnishings, real estate, technology, personal care and beauty, business, education, travel & tourism, health & fitness, and eCommerce.

You can also tailor your templates by season, so whether you’re sending Black Friday, Christmas, or Valentine’s Day email content, you’ll have a responsive, innovative template ready to go.

All EngageBay email templates are customizable, allowing you to easily create emails for broadcasts, sequences, drip campaigns, and automation.

Step 2: Make your design considerations

Next is the design of the email itself. Largely, this is up to you, but there are do’s and don’ts when designing emails.

I highly recommend you check out my post on the pillars of email design if you haven’t already seen it, as it will tell you everything you need to know about how to ace your design.

Here are some basics for you in the meantime.

The first order of business is selecting your layout. This is where you have the most freedom, but remember to include sections like photos and/or videos, copy, and a CTA button/link or two. You need whitespace to separate these elements so they don’t feel stacked atop each other.

Next, you need to consider mobile responsiveness. Up to 1.7 billion people will check their email on their phones versus 0.9 billion for desktops, so if your emails aren’t optimized for mobile, you will lose out on the valuable chance to connect with your target market.

Beyond that, your emails must also be branded, implementing your brand colors, logo, and style.

Step 3: Write compelling and clear content

The next step is to write quality email content. You can start with the email body or subject line, whichever you find easiest. Keep in mind that the content must reflect your business voice and brand.

Let’s start with some best practices for writing subject lines since many marketers and business owners agree this is the hardest part:

Keep the subject line within 50 to 60 characters.
Use power words such as “amazing,” “reliable,” “skilled,” “valued,” “insightful,” “connected,” “active,” “friendly,” “instant,” “top,” “guaranteed,” and “bargain.”
Ask a question, especially one that doesn’t have an obvious yes or no answer, to inspire more email opens.
Connect emotionally with the reader.
Incorporate personalization, including the customer’s name and a short blurb about their purchasing history.

Many of those tips are applicable when writing email content. You should prioritize conciseness wherever possible. There’s no need for an email to be a novella, but ensure you don’t skip valuable information to save space.

Use proper formatting, including paragraphs of three or four sentences and bullet points to break up content when needed. Likewise, you can add an image or video to divide paragraphs.

Please use a spell checker and grammar checker when writing emails. Typos and careless mistakes are embarrassing and easily preventable!

Step 4: Incorporate CTAs where appropriate

The last step is arguably one of the biggest: writing and implementing calls to action or CTAs.

In my article on email design, I mentioned that statistically, it’s been proven that using CTA buttons will improve email click-through performance compared to adding links.

Ideally, your email layout should use complementary colors, and the CTA button should be in a hue opposite those colors. The button color must be distinct enough to drive eyes to it and get visitors to click.

How to Customize Email Templates to Fit Your Business Needs

Welcome email template for office-based roles — *Source*

As mentioned, most platforms and tools that produce email templates allow you to build your own from scratch. The following guidance will ensure your custom email templates continue to serve your small business.

Segment your audience

One of the biggest uses of custom email templates is accommodating your audience segments and their unique needs and pain points. Before you can produce tailored email content, you need up-to-date audience segmentation.

Dividing your audience by geographics, demographics, and psychographics will divulge the insights you need to create customer avatars. Focus on income, industry, marital status, purchasing history, and decision-making capacity.

Align email templates with specific brand values

Next, you can alter the template to suit your small business brand. First, beginning with the visuals, what are your brand colors? You should replicate those in your email templates or use very similar hues.

I recommend uploading your brand logo at the email’s start or end. The logo should be high-resolution, but the file size shouldn’t be bloated.

Integrate personalized elements

Finally, you should incorporate personalization when and where possible, including tailored recommendations, the customer’s name, and their purchase history.

This makes connecting with them from sales and marketing perspectives easier and more meaningful.

How to Implement Email Templates in Your Business Strategy

Are you ready to unleash your email templates upon your audience and incorporate them into your small business marketing plan?

Excellent! These pointers will help you strategize effectively.

Review your value proposition

You must strongly express your value proposition in your small business emails, so it doesn’t hurt to brush up on what it is and fortify it if necessary. Understanding the unique elements of your small business and how they help you excel will benefit your brand across the board, not only in email marketing.

Train your staff on using email templates

If your team is used to writing emails from scratch, it can take some time to adjust to using templates. That’s why I recommend training them on how email templates work to ensure everyone is on the same page.

Beyond providing training on how templates work and why you’ve made the switch, you should also instruct your team on how and when to modify the templates, such as when connecting with specific audience segments.

Use email template management tools

You might struggle to track them all if you build enough email templates. This is where you should rely on tools.

I’d also suggest creating an organization system for your email template. For example, perhaps you categorize your templates by holiday, season, or occasion. You could even divide them based on a lead’s progress in the sales funnel or a customer’s level of engagement.

Test your emails

I saved the most important tip for last. A/B test your emails if you aren’t already.

Just because you’re using a template doesn’t mean your messages are destined for success. If you don’t test your emails among a similar audience, you could make basic mistakes that impede open and click-through rates.

For example, maybe your subject line isn’t as engaging as it could be, your CTA button should be a square instead of a rectangle, or maybe it should be blue rather than red.

There is no one straightforward design and email layout rule to follow, as it depends on your audience and their respective needs.

That’s why A/B testing is so advantageous, as it reveals insights about audiences like yours.

How to Measure the Impact of Email Templates

You’ve launched an email marketing campaign, but how did it perform? It’s time to dig into the following metrics to answer that all-important question.

These are the KPIs to track:

Open rates
Click-through rates
Conversion rates
Customer feedback and response times
Unsubscribe rates

Studying the data can give you valuable insights into your small business success. It won’t always be pretty. You might notice some discerning patterns emerge as you gather more data, but that’s okay.

There hasn’t been a major company that had straight success with their marketing. Dips are normal; failures and mistakes will happen when you’re new to email marketing. The key is to realize where you’re going wrong and try to course-correct if possible.

Pivoting away early saves you time and money rather than staying on the course when you know it’s doomed to fail.

You may notice outliers occasionally, whether it’s emails that unfortunately bombed hard or those with a higher-than-average success rate.

Both are worth paying attention to, as they can help you determine what kind of email content your audience gravitates toward and away from.

Conclusion

Investing time into developing and using email templates as a small business is valuable, as you can win back time and connect more efficiently with your audience by using personalized emails.

As a small business owner, I encourage you to experiment with different types of templates to discover which works best for your specific needs.

EngageBay is an all-in-one marketing, sales, and customer support software for small businesses, startups, and solopreneurs. You get email marketing, marketing automation, landing page and email templates, segmentation and personalization, sales pipelines, live chat, and more.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

1. What are the best free tools for creating email templates?

While many free email template tools exist in the marketplace, EngageBay is among the best.

It offers many free services to subscribers, including free email templates, and is geared toward startups and small businesses like yours. If you opt for a paid plan, the prices are affordable enough for tiny companies on a budget.

2. How often should I update my email templates?

Change your email templates seasonally and around specific holidays to ensure your content is relevant and timely.

3. Can email templates improve my marketing ROI?

Yes, certainly. Using templates ensures your emails are more readable, personalized, and engaging, making email marketing more cost-effective for your small business.

4. What are the common mistakes to avoid when using email templates?

Using the same email templates as everyone else will produce cookie-cutter results that fail to move the needle.

You should also optimize your email content, limit how many images and videos you add, and ensure your font is readable in terms of typeface and color. By far, the biggest mistake you can make is failing to test your emails before launching them.

5. How can I ensure email templates comply with email marketing laws and regulations?

Make it easy for subscribers to leave your email list, and don’t hold them, hostage, if they wish to opt-out. When you send advertisements or promo emails, disclose that information, and don’t mislead your audience through your subject lines or body content.

6. Should I use images in my email templates?

Yes, as they’re a great way to drive up engagement. However, follow the 60-40 ratio for your email content, where 60% is copy, and 40% is visuals like videos and images.