How to Justify Responsive Email Design For Mobile Email Clients… and Where to Get Help
It’s pretty shocking that more people utilize their smartphones to read email than to make phone calls (insert sarcasm about connectivity here). Purchases of older phone models have dropped by 17% year over year, and 180% more business people are utilizing their smartphones to preview, filter, and read email than did a few years ago.
The problem, though, is that email applications haven’t advanced as quickly as web browsers have. We’re still stuck with desktop web clients like Outlook that rely on older HTML to render an email correctly. Newer email clients will render the latest versions of HTML and CSS correctly, allowing amazing email experiences. It’s not easy to send an email and have it render correctly in the vast selection of smartphones, tablets, web, and software clients.
Using an email client and device preview platform is essential. Responsive email combines old-school table-driven HTML, CSS, and new HTML. The formatting and even the order of your email code are essential to maximizing the readability across viewports.
Download Free Responsive Email Templates
If your ESP doesn’t offer a responsive template, there are a few resources online to get help with responsive email:
- Beefree – we’ve shared this fantastic drag and drop editor that has several productized integrations with ESPs.
- Email on Acid – offers free email templates to get you up and running as fast as possible.
- Intuit Mailchimp has published some responsive templates on GitHub. And Respmail has added their improvements.
- Litmus has a selection built by Stamplia that you can download with the associated PSDs.
- Responsive Email Resources – A collection of tools and resources for responsive email design.
- Themeforest has a vast selection of incredible paid offerings, Photoshop files, and instructions.
- Zurb – has published a series of mobile-responsive email templates.
Services for Email Design and Responsive Coding
- Uplers – if you need a new design or have a design that needs to be coded, the folks at Uplers have done a fine job for a few of our clients!
- DK New Media, if you have a unique problem and need assistance with it, don’t hesitate to reach out!
As email marketers, responsive design has been a hot topic for a number of years as this inexorable growth has gathered steam. We’ve now reached the point where responsive email design, IS email design! In Instiller’s latest infographic, we’ve compiled a bunch of eye-catching statistics that underscore the importance of catering to mobile users with your email communications.
Steve Painter, Instiller
Instiller is an Email Service Provider specifically built for agencies that offer a complete email solution to design, send and report on the email sent to their clients (they also include some deliverability tools and reputation monitoring).
The folks at Litmus have put together this fantastic infographic and accompanying article, The How-To Guide to Responsive Email Design.
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