Resources Hub » Knowledge base » What Is a Responsive Email?

Marketing is changing every day, and keeping up with these changes can be challenging. Take email marketing, for example. It’s come a long way since the 1990s. One of the most important developments in the field has been the application of responsive emails.

Here’s what you need to know about them and how they can help your brand.

What is a responsive email?

A responsive email is a newsletter that has special coding that allows it to display perfectly across different devices. For example, without making use of responsive emails, the same newsletter that shows up perfectly on a PC monitor can look garbled and poorly crafted on a mobile device.

With responsive emails, your newsletter content will display seamlessly across the vast breadth of mobile devices, ranging from tablets to iPhones. Responsive emails work by setting up two layers of CSS code. One layer takes care of desktop display, which you would use for emails going out to clients who use Outlook. The other CSS layer is where the magic happens. On the second layer, additional code is used to make the email show up properly on mobile devices.

With the two CSS layers, your newsletters will be responsive, which will allow them to show up crisp and clear, whether your recipients open them on a PC or a smartphone.

The easiest way to implement this is to use responsive email templates. These templates are mobile-responsive and ready to go.

How to measure the success of responsive emails

To measure the success of your responsive emails, you should be using the same metrics you’ve been using for your email marketing campaigns. Compare your click-through, open, subscribe, and unsubscribe rates to the figure you were getting before implementing responsive emails.

What you should see are higher open, click-through, and subscribe rates paired with a much lower unsubscribe rate. Without responsive emails, people who subscribe to receive your newsletters will quickly unsubscribe if your emails display poorly on mobile devices.

Do the smart thing and get on board; start using responsive emails today and stun your customers with compelling newsletter content like this.

Does it really matter?

In marketing today, responsive emails are shifting from optional to necessary. Responsive emails have become an expectation.

The demand for responsive emails has grown in tandem with the sharp rise in users who read emails straight from mobile devices rather than a PC.

If your newsletters aren’t optimized for mobile devices, they’ll display poorly and turn customers away.

The number of emails opened from mobile devices jumped 500% in a 3-year span.

That kind of incredible growth speaks volumes. With so many people opening emails from mobile devices, it’s imperative that your newsletters be mobile-friendly, meaning you should be using responsive emails.

What now?

Now that you know more about responsive emails, what they are, and why they’re important, it’s time to start putting this knowledge into action. Responsive emails are going to be an important growth tool for a long time to come.

Knowing how to make and use responsive emails that perform well on mobile devices has become a chief responsibility among email designers. Learn more about how to optimize your newsletters for mobile users with Campaign Monitor.

This blog provides general information and discussion about email marketing and related subjects. The content provided in this blog ("Content”), should not be construed as and is not intended to constitute financial, legal or tax advice. You should seek the advice of professionals prior to acting upon any information contained in the Content. All Content is provided strictly “as is” and we make no warranty or representation of any kind regarding the Content.

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