Sending Back to School Emails during the Coronavirus

Use familiar branding elements

During times of uncertainty and while making an important announcement, it is always good for your recipient to have a sense of familiarity when they open your email.

Although it may seem easier to write a quick plain text email, sending a HTML email allows you to incorporate familiar branding elements such as your institution's logo or badge, your font choice, color scheme and other important formatting aspects.

This makes your email message much more powerful and allows it to resonate more with the reader.

Format text sensibly

Many schools and universities that are opening their doors again will have introduced a range of new safety measures. Your email is the best place to communicate these to students, staff or parents.

Opt for a list layout to present the most important changes to readers. This way, you can be certain that nothing important gets overlooked by people skim reading the text.

A list layout is a good way to clearly present large amounts of information.

Tip: Mail Designer 365 offers you various list styles that you can use in your designs to highlight key information.

Choosing appropriate styling options for your text is also essential in ensuring it is clear and easy to follow. After choosing a sensible font, you can also format the size, weight, line height and spacing of your text to optimize the reading experience.

For example, italicising or making certain words or phrases bold can be an effective way to emphasise their importance:

The bold and underlined emphasis on these headlines make them clearer and more effective in the email.

Link out to further information and resources

Rather than allowing your email to become too saturated with information, it's much more effective to link out to extra resources.

You've introduced a new set of rules for your sports teams? Instead of listing them alongside your core guidelines, you can link out to them on a separate page or document so that they don't take up too much space in your email and distract from the core message.

Doing this makes your email much easier to read and allows recipients to actively click on the story or news they want to know more about.

How to link out:

As well as regular text links, Mail Designer 365 also allows you to create stylish buttons and eye-catchers. You can use these to signpost further information in your emails:

A button linking to further resources looks much better in your design than masses of information.

All you need to do is select a shape from the contents library, apply a color of your choice and use text objects to point readers in the right direction. When you are done, apply a link to the entire image area to your preferred landing page.

Learn more about creating buttons and eye-catchers.

Optimize your design for mobile

It's a well known fact that many of us regularly use our phones to check emails on the go. The same goes for your students, staff and other recipients.

In order to ensure your email is also clear and effective on smartphones and tablets, we recommended that you optimize your design for mobile.

Mail Designer 365 automatically creates a mobile version of your design which you can then adapt to make more suitable for smaller screens. This includes creating separate text styles for mobile and using mobile blocks to create exclusive, mobile-only content like app download links:

Optimizing your emails for mobile devices allows you to also create exclusive mobile-only content.

Create Back to School Emails in Mail Designer 365

We hope these tips will help you when putting together an email announcement for your school, college or university this fall.

If you're considering building up an email strategy for your institution this year, Mail Designer 365 has all the resources you need to get started, including dedicated email templates for education:

Don't have a Mail Designer 365 plan yet? Download the app free today to discover the email templates as well as a wide range of design tools to help you get started with email for education.

With real estate being one of the largest industries worldwide, the way you market your services to potential new clients is super important. Gone are the days of splashing out for expensive brochures, flyers and printed ads; communication with clients today needs to be direct and straight to the point, in order for you to be heard.

In this quick guide, we're taking you through the essentials of email marketing for real estate, including best practice tips, template ideas and how to get started.

Why use email marketing for real estate?

There are many reasons why email marketing is a great strategy to explore for your real estate business. First and foremost, email marketing is cost-effective and in comparison to other methods, very easy to implement. In a world where we are constantly checking our smartphones, email marketing is also a proven direct channel straight to your existing clients and potential new customers.

Ideas for real estate emails

Depending on what your agency specialises in, there is a whole world of possibilities for incorporating email into your sales and marketing strategy. Here are some examples of real estate emails you could be sending...

Welcome email

A welcome email is a great way for you to greet new newsletter signups and introduce yourself to new clients. Use a warm and friendly tone to make new clients feel at ease and make sure to show them your current listings.

Listing newsletter

Send out regular listing newsletters to showcase new properties to homebuyers and keep your clients up to date with the latest listings.

Open house invitation

Invite potential buyers to upcoming open house events or viewing appointments with a friendly email invitation.

Email digest and tips

Demonstrate your authority in the real estate sector by sharing blog posts and news in a monthly digest. Sending a regular tips newsletter is a great way to also share your expert tips with first time buyers or sellers who are new to the property market.

Follow up email

Send a friendly follow up email to maintain customer relationships even after a sale has gone through. This is also a good opportunity to ask for feedback or for a referral of your services.

How to create email templates for real estate

Now you have some ideas on real estate emails to send, you're probably asking yourself how to bring them to life. With a drag & drop email editor like Mail Designer 365, you can build professional email templates for your business in minutes. Start with a blank canvas or choose a Design Idea from our selection of real estate email templates.

Here are a few best practice tips to consider along the way...

Brand identity

To get started, make sure your company name and logo is clearly identifiable at the top of every email you send. This demonstrates a sense of professionalism and immediately makes it clear to your clients that the email is from you.

Real estate is a very serious business and it is important your clients feel they can trust you and your business to help them sell their property or find a new home. If you have team photos on hand, it can also be useful to include these in your email so clients recognise a familiar face.

In Mail Designer 365, you can save your company email headers to reuse in future designs and ensure your brand's identity is consistent in all your emails:

Layout

The layout you choose for your email design is very important, as it determines the way you present key information to clients. This is particularly relevant when showcasing new listings or updating property information.

Choose a clear layout which clients can quickly scan through to find out more about newly available properties.

Tip: Remember, you don't have to include too much information in the email. List the key selling points for each property to capture clients' interest and include a link to the full listing on your website.

In Mail Designer 365, you can choose from a wide variety of layout options. Use the table editor to present your latest listings in a smart, mobile-optimised table, or explore a range of combi layout blocks to showcase a featured property in more detail.

A table layout is a great way to give clients a clear overview of your latest listings.

Call to action

Your call-to-action (CTA) is the most important part of your email as it shows the recipient what they need to do next.

Whatever your intended CTA is, it's important that it is prominent in your email. Generally, this can be achieved by inserting an eye-catching button somewhere in your email. Opt for a color which will stand out in your design and a short and actionable text.

Typical CTAs for real estate emails may include:

• Get in touch
• Arrange a callback
• Enquire today
• Register now (i.e. for an open house event)
• Leave a review

Opt for a vibrant CTA button to help draw your clients in.

Images and eye-catchers

High quality images are a must have for any real estate email. First impressions are important and choosing the best images of your properties will help gain your client's attention and get them onto your website.

Once you've decided on your images, you can integrate them into your layout using the layout block options discussed above. Including an eye-catcher or badge to highlight featured properties is another way to make your design speak volumes.

Explore a range of shapes and graphic elements in Mail Designer 365 to create vibrant badges for your email designs. Use these to point readers towards new listings, price reductions and other key information:

Inserting eye-catchers and badges into your design help to present important information more effectively.

Contact Information

Finally, make sure your contact information is also easy to locate in the email. If a client sees something that catches their eye, they don't want to then waste time looking all over for your phone number. It's important they are able to get in touch with you quickly and easily.

Add your contact information somewhere prominent in your email design so the recipient can find it faster. Like with your email header and other layout aspects, you can also save this block to use over and over again in future designs.

Including direct mailto and phone links is one super convenient way to make sure clients can reach you directly from your email. In Mail Designer 365, you can even pre-fill email or SMS messages to make things even easier for you and your clients:

Mailto links allow clients to reach you directly from your email

Get started with email marketing for real estate today

We hope you've found this guide to email marketing for real estate useful and will consider applying some of these tips to your own marketing strategy. Getting started with email marketing for your real estate business is easy and affordable:

1. Download Mail Designer 365 free
2. Use one of our dedicated real estate email templates, or create your own design from scratch.
3. Send finished designs directly to clients via Mail Designer 365 Delivery Hub

No matter the size of your organization, sending a regular internal newsletter to employees has many benefits. Not only do internal newsletters greatly help with internal communications, they also provide a good way to boost staff morale and maintain a positive working environment.

Starting up an employee newsletter for the first time can be daunting. Which content to include, how to put it together, when to send... These are all valid questions to consider during the planning process.

To help give you some inspiration, we're giving you an exclusive inside look into the model we use for our own internal newsletter here at Mail Designer 365 HQ, as well as useful tips to consider when creating a successful internal newsletter for your own organization.

Skip to

• Benefits of creating an internal newsletter
• Our internal newsletter Strategy - an inside look
• How to create an internal newsletter

Benefits of creating an internal newsletter

You may be asking yourself why you should spend the time creating an internal newsletter when there are so many other communication channels available. Here are 3 key benefits:

1. Communication

While Slack and similar internal messaging tools may be more convenient than email, their fast moving nature makes it very easy to miss an important announcement.  In contrast, an internal email newsletter goes straight to your employees' inboxes and is much more likely to be opened.

2. Convenience

The number of communication platforms now available (e.g. messaging channels, intranet, bulletin boards, social media groups, etc.) can result in news and announcements being shared in multiple different places. This can be confusing and makes it hard for staff to keep track.

An internal newsletter allows you to compile all of this information into one convenient email so employees can catch up on anything they may have missed.

3. Corporate Identity

Brand image is an important aspect of any business; both internally and externally. While there are many tools that allow you to communicate with staff, an email newsletter is the best way to ensure you're maintaining your corporate identity whilst doing so.

Creating a custom template for your email newsletter ensures important aspects like your logo, company ethos, brand guidelines, etc., don't go forgotten. This is especially effective in larger organizations, as it helps give everyone in the team a sense of unity, regardless of their physical location.

Our Internal Newsletter Strategy

For obvious reasons, accessing internal newsletters from other companies to show you as examples is not really an option. Because of this (and because we're also super proud of it), we're giving you an insight into how we do things here at Mail Designer 365 HQ.

Here's a quick profile of our internal team newsletter:

• Name: Zeitpunkt Journal (named after our beloved HQ, Zeitpunkt Haus.)
• Editor in Chief: Our very own Lisa Heisenberg
• Sending frequency: Every week on Wednesdays
• Topics covered: Office announcements, personell news, important reminders, current affairs, team fun, memes, and more!
• Newsletters sent: As of today (July 15th 2020), 69 issues

We start off all our weekly journals with the issue number and a quick introduction message before getting to the main content

What we include in our internal newsletters

Primarily, we use our internal newsletter as a tool to share important news and announcements with the whole team. Good communication is a super important part of our workflow and our newsletter helps keep everyone up to date on new changes.

Here are some recent examples of content we've included in our internal newsletter:

Health and safety guidelines: Covid-19 has been difficult for us all to come to terms with. To help prevent the spread, we (like many other businesses) recently reviewed our health and safety measures and shared the new guidelines in our internal newsletter.

Your internal newsletter is THE place to let everyone know about important new changes.

Team updates: We are a growing team and enjoy welcoming new people on board (take a look at our current job offers.) The Zeitpunk Journal is the perfect place for us to announce new staff members to the rest of our team and also help newcomers feel welcome when they start.

Important dates: Like many businesses, we hold regular events, such as team building activities, meetings, and social activities. We use the Zeitpunkt Journal to remind everyone in the team about upcoming dates and any events they may want to add to their calendar. Here is a recent example for the Apple WWDC Keynote event.

Help the team keep track of important dates by including them in your internal newsletter.

Recurring sections in our internal newsletter

Of course, the content we include in our internal newsletter changes from week to week, but there are a few segments we like to keep consistent. Here are some examples of recurring sections you can typically find each week in the Zeitpunkt Journal...

Zeitpunkt Haus Survival Tips: Useful tips and life hacks to help make office life easier.

Useful tips to help make life in the office easier.

Tweet of the Week: Because who doesn't love Twitter? Here we showcase the funniest content found on Twitter that week.

Sad, but painfully accurate.

Team Lunch Friday: On Fridays, we get together and cook great food as a team. What better way to announce this than via a segment in our internal newsletter?

Feeling hungry?

Team activities: When we're not busy working on Mail Designer 365, we also love to partake in fun team building activities. In the last few weeks, the whole team has been taking part in an exciting table tennis tournament. Our internal newsletter has been a great way to keep track of results and upcoming matches.

Use your internal newsletter to promote team building activities.

How to build an internal newsletter in Mail Designer 365

If you're planning on sending out an internal newsletter each week, you need the right tools to do this with. Of course, we use Mail Designer 365 to build, edit and send our newsletter to the whole team.

Mail Designer 365's drag and drop layout builder makes it easy to create professional email designs in minutes.

Our top tips for creating internal newsletters in Mail Designer 365:

• Save and duplicate your master template to reuse the layout in all your future newsletters
• Set up text styles to make editing easy and keep the design consistent
• Make your designs fun using tools such as the Unsplash library for photo backgrounds and shapes & graphic elements for buttons and eye-catchers

Mail Designer 365 has a wide range of shapes and graphic elements to help you spice up your designs.

• Use the smartphone view to optimize your design for mobile for those viewing it on the go
• Send via your work email account in Mail Designer 365 to securely send your newsletter directly to your staff. Here's how to set this up

We hope you have enjoyed your insider look behind the scenes at how we create our internal newsletters here at Mail Designer 365 HQ. Head over to Mail Designer 365 today to test these tips and try your hand at creating an internal newsletter your team will love.

Don't have a Mail Designer 365 plan yet? Sign up for your free trial today to test all these features and discover a wide range of creative tools and HTML email Design Ideas.

Until next time,

Your Mail Designer 365 Team

There's no denying that online events are massively on the rise. If you take a glance at the average business calendar today, you'll likely see event titles that didn't even exist 10 years ago. (Ever heard of a virtual trade fair? I hadn't until researching for this post!)

Of course, as the way we hold events changes, so does the way we market them. In this guide, we talk about some great online event ideas for your business, plus the best tools to help you ensure your event is a success.

Jump to:

• Advantages of Online Events
• Online Event Ideas
• Best Tools for Online Events
• Preparing for Online Events

Why should I host an online event?

Quite simply put, the main advantage of a virtual event is flexibility. The majority of the time, all your guests need to get involved is a working internet connection - which is definitely not hard to come by these days!

Because online events are so flexible, people can take part from wherever they are - whether it's from the comfort of their own homes, or from their office 5000 miles away from the actual location. This flexibility means your event can reach a much wider audience of new potential leads.

More advantages of hosting an online event include:

• Diversify your audience - As well as your audience being generally larger, it also has the potential of being much more diverse. With an online event, geographic restrictions don't apply. As long as you choose a fairly neutral time zone, guests from all over the world can attend.
• Reduce costs - Hiring a venue, paying temporary staff, organising catering and booking transport are all things that can cost your business a huge amount of money. Although there will be some costs associated with your online event, you will save big by removing all the physical elements.
• Save time - All the elements named above also take a large amount of time to organise and coordinate. Free up your time to focus on the content of your online event rather than planning the theatrics behind a physical event.
• Lower your carbon footprint - Many people attending large scale events will have to drive a great distance or even fly to get to the location. This results in an extra amount of carbon emissions which can easily be avoided by hosting your event online.
• Great for brand image - Although online events are definitely on the rise, in many respects, they are still a very new trend. Hosting an online event is a great way to show your target audience that your business is innovative and in touch with the latest technology.

Types of Online Events

Video Meeting

A video meeting does exactly what the name describes. These types of meetings can take place on any scale and for any use case: no matter how big or small. Here are a few popular examples:

• Daily briefing meeting
• Job interview
• Project status update meeting
• Project review meeting
• Department meeting
• Financial planning meeting
• Shareholder meeting

For many, an offsite meeting means travel costs, food & drink and possibly an overnight stay all being charged to company expenses. Not to mention the time taken to get there and back is time which could have been spent doing other important work. Holding a video meeting means all participants can join from their respective locations and save the company time and money.

Video meetings are also a game changer for remote-based teams to stay connected. All you need to get started is a working internet connection, a headset and a video meeting platform to host from.

Webinar

A webinar is an online seminar most typically used to educate viewers on a particular topic. This could be anything from a step-by-step product demonstration (particularly popular with software companies) to a university-style lecture on a given theme (e.g. How to create a website for your small business.)

Most often, a webinar is a mixture of pre-recorded screen sharing with voiceover commentary; however, the webinar host(s) can also choose to livestream the event in order to allow for interactive elements such as a Q&A session or a quiz. Usually, a webinar won't last longer than an hour.

Pro tip: When you send out your invitations, make sure you outline exactly what will be covered in the webinar so people will be more willing to sign up. For more great tips on how to market your webinar, check out this guide.

Virtual Summits

This type of online event involves you sourcing established guest speakers from your field to come together and collaborate. Participants tend to discuss a chosen topic (i.e. education or technology), or provide solutions for well known industry problems (e.g. how to increase student participation in your classroom.)

Guest speakers will generally prepare material to present and, if held live, offer the audience the chance for a Q&A session.

While this type of event is usually less specific to your business, it is a great opportunity for lead generation. Each guest speaker brings a virtual audience with them; all of which become potential leads for your business.

An event like this is also a great way to establish your authority in your industry and gain key contacts.

Pro tip: To ensure things run smoothly, start planning the dynamics of your virtual summit quite far in advance. It can also be beneficial for guest speakers to pre-record their content to make the event appear more seamless on the day.

Online Course & Training

An online course is a type of online learning environment which can be set up to deliver lessons or follow-along courses on a particular subject. An online course can consist of a series of sessions (i.e. for distance learning or online qualifications) or it can be a one-off event.

If held live, online training events are generally best suited to smaller groups, in order to recreate the classroom experience and allow for participants to ask questions. While there is still an element of presentation, an online course is intended to be a much more interactive experience for those involved.

Pro tip: After streaming a live lesson, it's a good idea to upload your video to a portal where participants can then watch it back at a later date.

Virtual Tradeshow

Similar to a physical trade fair, a virtual tradeshow is a type of online marketing event which is held to give participants the chance to present their products to potential buyers.

Most typically, each vendor will have a dedicated "booth" in which they can present prepared material including webinars, tutorials and product introductions. Many virtual tradeshows also have e-commerce integration so attendees can purchase directly.

Although the virtual tradeshow may be the biggest change to the real thing, it is a great strategy for companies who want to cut down on costs, or businesses looking to try innovative new methods to reach new customers.

6 Awesome Tools for Online Events

With online events on the rise, more and more awesome tools are becoming available to help businesses guarantee their events are a success. Below, we have highlighted some of the current leading tools for managing and hosting online events. Skim through the list to see the key features and click through to the operator website to find out more!

1. Zoom

Zoom is currently one of the most popular choices for online meetings.

• Video meeting platform for up to 1000 participants (with up to 49 videos on screen)
• Webinar services also available
• Interactive features such as polls for a more engaging experience
• Free plans available for basic features
• Learn more about Zoom

2. Google Meet

Google Meet is a brand new video conferencing platform by Google which replaces their Hangouts Meet platform.

• Video conferences for up to 250 participants
• Free plans available for conferences with up to 100 participants (starting offer: conferences can last up to 24 hours until September 30th, 2020!)
• Personalised plans with advanced features and livestream capabilities available for enterprises
• Learn more about Google Meet

3. Adobe Connect

Adobe Connect is a standalone, advanced web conferencing software.

• Great for training, online classrooms and tutorial-style webinars
• Create custom layouts to help control what your audience sees and how they interact with your online event
• Layouts are reusable and can be used again and again - great for maintaining consistency throughout multiple sessions (i.e. online training courses.)
• Learn more about Adobe Connect

4. Cvent

Cvent is an event management platform for larger online events.

• Management options help event organizers process registration and attendees
• Easy to integrate with other apps and programs (i.e. CRM systems and virtual meeting platforms)
• Built in email marketing tools and HTML editor for custom email designs
• Platform provides useful after-event analysis to help determine ROI and event insights
• Learn more about Cvent

5. GoToMeeting by LogMeIn

GoToMeeting is a video meeting tool with dedicated add-ons for conferences and webinars.

• Video meetings for up to 250 participants
• Includes GoToWebinar platform for managing live or pre-recorded online webinar events. After event analysis tools also available. (P.S. Learn more about webinar marketing here.)
• Support for personalised channels to make your webinar content available on demand
• Meeting transcription tools available in some plans
• Learn more about GoToMeeting

6. vFairs

vFairs is a virtual events platform that allows users to plan and structure tailor made online events.

• 3D virtual event environment for a realistic experience
• Custom event landing pages and bespoke booths for your product
• Add on tools for webinars plus e-commerce integration
• After-event analysis and lead collection for networking
• Learn more about vFairs

Using Mail Designer 365 to Prepare for Your Online Event

The build up to your online event is just as important as the event itself. During this time, you need to successfully promote your event among your target audience and ensure you have as many sign ups as possible.

The best way to generate attention around your online event is with email marketing. A solid email strategy helps you sell your event to invitees and allows you to follow up with potential leads once the event is over.

Mail Designer 365 has all the creative tools you need to build impressive an email invitation for your online event, as well as reminder emails and follow up campaigns. Check out this post to find out more about email strategy for online events.

Use this Mail Designer 365 email template to announce a webinar, Zoom meeting, conference, or any other online business event.

Until next time,

Your Mail Designer 365 Team