Question: Your January article, "Email Design No-Nos Your Designer May Not Know" seemed a bit extreme to me. Are you implying that email marketers shouldn't use graphics or navigation in their email newsletter messages?

Answer: Our email newsletter uses lots of graphics, and it also has a navigation bar. So, no, we're not advocating a return to the dinosaur age of boring email design. We're simply suggesting that we can all be a bit smarter and more focused as to how we use both of these visual elements.

Let's start with graphics.

Taking responsibility for how we use graphics means understanding that oftentimes images will be blocked. Why not use HTML backgrounds, colors and fonts to build your visual elements wherever possible? They're eye-catching, and they work whether images are turned on or turned off.

We're also big on making sure key text and calls to actions stand alone, instead of being embedded within graphics. If you keep text as text and graphics as graphics, you'll go a long way toward ensuring that your emails are still legible, and more importantly, clickable – even when graphics are blocked.

As for navigation, if your email newsletter contains a Web-page-like navigation bar, you may want to play with its placement and streamline the number of links.

As I mention in the article, many mobile devices convert HTML to plain text. In the process, they transform short, easy-to-read URLS such as Read Full Article into the full URL link, which may actually be quite long, especially when displayed on a 2"-wide mobile screen: http://newsletter.lyrishq.com/c.html?rtr=on&s=3d2,148pj,2ed4,8bhr,lz3o,czcx,c4cv.

So it's generally a good idea to make sure that your navigation bar appears below your primary call to action, instead of at or near the top of your email. That way, mobile readers can at least find out what your email is about before they get inundated with a string of really long URL links.

You may also want to look back at the last six email campaigns and see how many clicks each navigation-bar link actually receives. Navigation-bar links that nobody's clicking are good candidates for removal.

In our recent email newsletter redesign, we went from two navigation bars that were both located near the top of the email to a single navigation bar that's now at the very bottom of the email. We also chose to sprinkle a few of the most important navigation links into the email copy in different ways. This ensures the links are still prominent, but they're not clumped together in a way that forces mobile readers to scroll and scroll and scroll and scroll.

But don't just take our word for it. Make simple changes to your email images and navigation, then test the new design against your current design. May the most effective approach win.

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About the Author

Anita M. Taylor is online marketing manager at Oversee.net.

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