Throwback Trends from 2016
Email Design Trends Which May Continue to Delight in 2017
Light-weight GIF in Email
From announcing sale discount to inducing sheer delight, animated GIFs have constantly been used in emails sent in the year 2016. GIF is a love child of a video and a static image, such that it contains multiple animating frames. Thankfully it is not resource heavy like a video and occupies slightly more file space than a static JPEG image.
The emails from Anthropologie and NEST feature an animated hero image which immediately grabs attention.
Flat Design in Emails
Flat design in email was inspired to maintain continuity to the recent UI changes observed in both Android and iOS. The color palette is full of softer shades of colors paired with white background to provide an overall
clean look, besides facilitating eye scan pattern while reading the emails.
In the past year, to maintain a design consistency with their fitness app, Fitbit has adopted flat design in their emails.
Email credits: ReallyGoodEmails.com
Minimalistic Email Design
Micro-blogging sites and SMS have made people accustomed to absorb more information with less amount of content. This gave rise to a new trend of minimalistic design. With reduced attention span observed while reading emails, subscribers need to be wowed as soon as the email is opened.
J. Crew’s emails feature a single image that builds the suspense and conveys the message with minimalistic email body.
Email credits: ReallyGoodEmails.com
Unconventional Email Design
Anything that is not expected always brings delight. Some brands go the extra mile to create unconventional email template
designs that surprises and delights
subscribers.
Clothing retailer Chubbies, adopted the iOS messaging style to portray a conversation between two marketers while subtly announcing their sale. Email credits: ReallyGoodEmails.com. Also, the Thanksgiving emailer 2016 from EmailMonks featured a coupon code within the email.
Email Master Templates
Owing to their branding guidelines, many companies have a similar looking email layout for their email series. Similarly, when you set up an email automation, it is very important to maintain a consistent design in every email to connect with your subscribers. This means that some portions of an email layout haven’t changed. This led to the creation of Master Templates with modular sections, which is a relief for the email designer as well as email developer. By replicating the common elements, the template production process becomes easier and faster.
We at Emailmonks have developed Master templates for Campaign Monitor, Mailchimp and ExactTarget. Grab yours by clicking here.
Updates of 2016
That Changed the Game for Email Design
Two major announcements from 2016 created a stir in the email industry which turned out to be a turning point for how emails shall be designed from that point onwards.
to support media query
On 14th September, 2016 Google announced, via their Apps developer blog, support to media query for their email clients in all devices. This was a great positive move towards responsive emails being rendered flawlessly in Gmail without developers jumping through hoops.
No longer Spongy layout
Gmail’s lack of support for media query forced developers to code emails without using media query, which is called Spongy Layout. This means sacrificing certain elements and animations to maintain compatibility. With the roadblock away for good, designers can just focus on certain better email layouts.
No more forcing desktop in Gmail
Gmail automatically bumped the font of an email when opened in mobile devices, which tend to ruin the desired layout. So via coding, the desktop layout was forced. Besides, responsive emails support, there is a separate layout for Desktop and Mobile.
Updates
An iDevice and iOS update never fails to dazzle the consumer with joy and awe. In iOS 10, two new features widely affected the email designed for Apple devices.
Unsubscribe bumped to top
For an email sent to an emailing list, Apple mail automatically featured a ribbon at the top, which contained sender details along with an option to unsubscribe. This meant that email marketers need to make the email lucrative so that the subscribers interact with the email instead of immediately clicking the unsubscribe link.
From design point of view, this means in 2017 email shall feature improved pre-header text and subject lines. Once the email is opened, a layout that dispenses information in a flow that guides the subscribers’ eye path away (from the unsubscribe ribbon) shall be crucial.
iOS re-playing videos
People love to visualize more than reading. With different companies adopting video marketing channel, videos in email is a path forward. Embedded video in email was introduced in 2009 and was a rage amongst supporting devices. But suddenly iOS 9 dropped support for playing any embedded video in the email and gradually other email clients followed the suit. Thankfully answering the prayers of innumerable email marketers, iOS 10 again started supporting embedded video playback in emails.
Glimpses of the Future
To Make an Engaging Email Even More Engaging
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Keyframe Animation
As mentioned earlier, GIF manages to balance between a static image and a moving video but the animation is very choppy and abrupt. However, animating using keyframe results in animations to be smoother and frame change are less obvious. Currently supported in Apple and Android devices, it is really huge step forward in terms of animations within email. Hover effects, linear and parallel movement of different elements within emails make it really eye catching.
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Cinemagraph (Static + Moving gif)
Taking a step forward to provide a cinematic effect to the GIF - Cinemagraph GIFs shall be used to fool the subscriber in believing they are viewing a looped video.
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No more 600px email width & End for responsive design
More and more devices introduced in the market come equipped with 2K and 4K resolutions. So the native email clients tend to render desktop layout in landscape orientation. Also, desktops with larger screens are being introduced in the market, emails no longer need to be restricted to be coded for the width of 600px.
This also eliminates the need to cram the content in ‘above the fold’ as in desktop devices. Content in desktop layout can be adjusted horizontally and the same content can be stacked vertically for displaying on mobile devices. This may mean end of the need for responsiveness when designing an email for Apple devices.
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Live Backgrounds
Emails with backgrounds that change with time, or a looped video playing in the background shall soon be gracing your inbox. From the overall design viewpoint, it shall be a giant leap. While it would mean zero-error, rendering shall be necessary in such cases to avoid broken layouts and in turn broken user experience.
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Increased implementation of interactive elements
With an increasing amount of email clients supporting CSS, interactive elements such as Accordions, Menus, Countdown timers integrated forms, sticky CTA shall be used in emails more frequently.
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Search in emails
Imagine a scenario wherein you may be able to go through a retailer’s entire collection by inputting a search term right in the email’s embedded search bar. AirBnB has already included a search option in their emails and it is possible that many other brands shall jump into the bandwagon soon.
(menu)
(Accordion)
“The year 2016 was the year of Pokémon Go. And, despite a fade down the stretch, its overall popularity — including 55 million users in its first month — makes one thing very clear: location-based data is still the key to understanding customer context, as mobile becomes the dominant screen.
From traditional channels like email to more bleeding-edge platforms like augmented reality, virtual reality and 360-degree video, location data powers insights on how to best engage customers in a more personalized way through mobile. That’s why 2016 will go down as the year most advertisers realized just how critical geospatial data will be for the future.”
– Daniel Brzezinski, GetResponse-
Increased Dynamic Content in emails
It is an age of personalized emails. One wrong move and you risk to lose a subscriber who shall unsubscribe. Most ESPs now offer the option to add a dynamic block for the content that shall change as per the defined customer persona. Customized content based on preferences such as location, age, sex, purchase history, user engagement, device info, etc. shall enable marketers to cater to a larger audience effortlessly.
“Gone are the days where your most important content had to be included “above the fold” to maximise engagement. With a majority of recipients now opening on mobile and increased client support, scroll will be embraced and drive use of innovative interactive elements, like parallax.”
– Jackie Roberts, Envato