A professionally done newsletter can leave a significant impact on your target audience but only if it is in the appropriate format.
The most common formats for designing and distributing online newsletters are HTML, plain text and PDF. All these three formats have their own advantages and disadvantages. To select the best suited format for your newsletter, you need to keep in view your target audience and the kind of subjects your newsletter covers.
Let's see what are the differences, benefits and disadvantages of the three different formats:
HTML
Among all the three formats, HTML is the most popular choice as along with text, images, pictures and graphics can also be used. A newsletter in HTML format looks very professional and more appealing and where you can describe your topics elaborately and attractively. It is also much easier to create a newsletter in HTML format as compared to PDF format.
But along with advantages, HTML has some shortcomings too. A newsletter in HTML format doesn't guarantee that it would open in all types of browsers. It might happen that your newsletter might look disorganized and disorderly on some incompatible computers.
This carries the inherent risk of losing out on customers since subscribers tend to unsubscribe from a newsletter if it does not open properly. Hence aim at making the HTML design as compatible as possible and test it in various browsers and email systems before sending it to the readers.
You can buy readymade and tested HTML templates or you can also approach a competent web and graphic design agency in the UK, or the USA to create a compatible HTML design for your newsletter.
Plain Text
The plus point of having a plain text format is that you don't to approach any web expert for HTML coding or for making a complex PDF document. You can create plain text newsletter easily and much faster. In addition to this, a plain text newsletter has much less chances to be labelled as spam.
But plain text newsletter can be purely content dependent and rather boring. The plain text does not make the newsletter look either appealing or attractive. However, if your newsletter is rich in content and does not need the added support of images and graphics, then plain text is the best format. It helps you to convey your message quickly and conveniently.
PDF is not used that extensively in comparison to other two formats. PDF emerges as the preferred option for newsletters that focus on topics like food, places etc., which require appealing graphics to accompany the text.
But creating a PDF newsletter is time-consuming and troublesome. You have to write the content in MS Word document and then convert it into PDF document using some program. And it is difficult to read too as the subscribers first have to wait to download it.
These are the three main formats for creating a newsletter. Keep in mind your target audience and topic of your newsletter, decide which kind of format would work best for your newsletter. Or best approach a web and graphic design company in the UK, the USA or India, they can guide you and then create an impressive newsletter in a format which would be ideal for your company.
James Elliott is a website designer who works with a UK based web Design Company Apart from working with the web design agency in the UK, he is also an amateur writer whose articles on web design, newsletters and graphics have been published in various newspapers, magazines and web portals. |
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