This article explores why The width of your Email messages is so important And will explain why Changes in technology are Forcing marketers to change The way they communicate, The Gurus Style Have you ever noticed that the Top Internet Marketing Gurus format their emails In a similar way? Do you understand Their Reasons for doing this Or do you just think they Like writing in short sentences? Have you ever wondered? Why they are making their messages Briefer and more direct? Why Skinny is Better Than Wide? As you start to change the way you communicate your messages will Have More IMPACT, Get opened more often And your readers will listen To what you have to say Some experts like Alex Mandosian Claim that 25-40 characters is the ideal Width and that you need to end each Line with a hard carriage return. If Someone sends him a message that isn’t Formatted in the style that he expects It just goes straight in the trash Others like Ed Dale don’t bother so much and go for up to 70 Characters. Anyone who has ever watched any of Ed’s videos will know that he likes to ramble on a bit, So I guess the people who follow him have got used to his style of presentation and enjoy his emails. Just How wide is 25 Characters? Wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww Iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa Ttttttttttttttttttttttttt Bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb And How Wide is 40 Characters? Wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww Iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa Tttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttt Bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb As you can see it varies so choose A width that is equivalent to 25-40 repetitions of the letter “a” What Happens If You Are Too Wide? If you choose to write long sentences with really wide paragraphs and not include any formatting and just continue without any regard for the fact that people will find it more difficult to read what you’ve written and if you are one of the few people who actually read a paragraph that is so long and doesn’t even pause for any breath by the time you get to end you have forgotten what the author was talking about because you are concentrating so hard to read all the words that they’ve written that you can’t actually understand anything and by the time you get to this far in the paragraph you are already so bored because the author hasn’t been able to get to the point and express what they meant to say and ended up repeating themselves . If they don’t get to the point and express what they meant to say and end up repeating themselves you might even decide to press the back button on your browser and go and give your attention to something that is a little easier and doesn’t make you work so hard and if you have managed to stay this long then you must either be a die hard fan or just one of those people who doesn’t like to miss any details, I would guess that maybe only 20% of my readers actually made it this far down the paragraph and the rest skipped to the next bit Did You Skip That Last Paragraph? If you did then you are like most normal people, When you see a big mass of text you tend to ignore it And skip on to the next bit, you probably read the first two sentences and maybe the last Write In A Way That Is Easy To Digest Its easy to lose interest and decide that its time to leave If you want to engage people you have to Write in away that makes it easy to digest Write in small chunks and Make sure that it’s well formatted and includes bolded subheadings Change Your Habits Now Where will the Internet be in 5 years time? Things are changing so rapidly that you Need to start adopting the right habits Now and not sometime in the future Technology Is Leading The Way There is a whole new generation who will consume The internet via handheld devices like the iphone, Ipod, nokia N95, Amazon Kindle etc. You only have to notice the increased use Of micro blogging platforms and video sites to understand the way thing are moving Will your message and content translate to this New medium or will you just become part of The background noise? Size Limitations These devices tend to have small, narrow screens so you don’t want to force people to scroll across to be able to read your message. The Essence Of Your Message If you have a call to action and include a link, place it where it can be easily seen straight after The opening sentences. You can grab more people this way. Those who want to read more can scroll down. Those who don’t can still get the Essence of your message in a quick glance. My next blog post in this series will be released very soon Are You Overweight? - 7 Reasons Why You Need To Put Your Email Messages On A Slimming Diet Share With Your Friends If you enjoyed this post please share it with your friends, you might also consider subscribing to my full RSS feed so you never miss a future post
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This post was inspired by a Marketing Online Live Podcast from Paul Colligan and Alex Mandossian
Ed Dale is complaining on Twitter that you called him fat!
interesting article. The skinnier width is great for scanning and skipping thru quickly but still getting the point. Most people who read a lot (like myself) don’t actually ‘read’ every word. I usally ‘digest’ 2-3 lines at a time and then stop to notate any references or something that really catches my eye. Needless to say, I very much agree with your theory
http://www.teenentrepreneurblog.com
Hey David,
Great post
I don’t get ignored. I find that one of my skills is to get on other site’s lists. You’d be suprised how many people try to entice me on a daily basis.
“Did You Skip That Last Paragraph?”
Sonofa!…. How did you…
…Yes, I did.
Shows the importance of whitespace.
It’s why sales letters and newspapers use 2-5 line paragraphs (usually only one sentence long)
Woh…great post. I got the more information from your blog. It is great for scanning and skipping through quickly but still getting the point.
A controversial title but you made an excellent point!!
I’ll try this one out on my next blog post
thanks
I must try that in my blog sometime and see how well it works, certainly you can scan and digest content far quicker with 40 characters, I think if I used 25 in my blog people would not take me seriously, actually I don’t know if they do anyway:)
It’s definitely easier. I’m reading a Kim Stanley Robinson book at the moment that I got VERY CHEAP on sale and I suspect that in addition to being too technical for a lot of people is that he has pages that are one paragraph of complex text with no dialogue. I love the topics in his book “Forty Signs of Rain” but I’m still struggling.
I have noticed that a lot of those pages you see that are very long and full of great reasons, anecdotes and quotes to convince you to buy a report or product and wait there’s more average around 60 characters, but as soon as I see them I delete the page anyway:)
That was a very cool read and man, I laughed as I got to the 6th line and gave up. Now I get why my fav blogger’s articles are so much fun to read haha clever
I am def going to follow this tip. Thank you!
Great article! You’re specifying hard returns at the end of each 25-40 char line. By this, are you saying that setting your “wrap” at 25 characters is not sufficient?
Thanks,
Cynthia
Insightful, timely
and fun post!
Point well-made.
And well-taken.
Thanks, Ian.
Great to have permission
to write like this.
I do already in my emails
(even though a friend said
it reminded him of E.J. Thribb)
But now – inspired by Ian -
I did so on my latest blog.
http://tinyurl.com/45lyz4
Great article Ian. I can totally understand
the concept behind this. but have to admit
that I find the 25 char emails a bit anoying.
its nice to read your article, and i am enjoy to stay and read anything in here
priceless. I've noticed only the big dogs do this.
and it explains why. Perfect.
perfect. perfect. thanks and thanks.
Great blog post, I wrote about it on my blog. Cheers for the top insight – http://www.themarketingdeviant.com/online-marketing/skinny-people-make-more-money-online-fat-people-get-ignored-email-marketing
Too many characters can get to be annoying I agree.