People form an opinion of your content within 50 milliseconds of clicking.

No, your readers can’t process your content in less than a second—but they can process your email design instantaneously. When they do, they’ll know immediately whether they want to read on.

Making sure your email content is well-produced and that it resonates with your audience is essential. But the design is what will determine whether they even give it a chance. If you get your readers to stick around, there are still smart email design decisions you can make that will make them more likely to convert.

Read on to learn more about email marketing conversion rate and how design deeply impacts your marketing conversions.

What are conversion rates in marketing?

Email marketing conversions take many forms for ecommerce brands. While purchases are the ultimate goal, valuable conversion actions extend far beyond the final sale. Many focus solely on sales, but email marketing conversion rates encompass multiple valuable actions: email opens, click-throughs, add-to-carts, and completed purchases.

Newsletter signups represent an important early-stage conversion, while resource downloads and wishlist additions indicate strong purchase intent. Account creations often signal long-term customer value potential, and engagement actions like survey completions and review submissions help build community while providing valuable insights. Even social media follows count as conversions, creating additional touchpoints for future marketing efforts. Understanding these micro-conversions helps build a complete picture of your email program’s effectiveness.

What is a good conversion rate for email?

For retail and ecommerce marketing emails, the average conversion rate typically hovers between 1-5%. However, this can vary based on your audience and campaign approach. Testing over time will help you establish a reliable baseline specific to your business. Regularly analyzing your results and refining factors like segmentation, personalization, and timing can improve your email conversion rate.

Monitoring trends in your email conversion rate over time can provide deeper insights into your audience’s behavior and preferences. Look for patterns tied to seasonality, product launches, or promotions, as these can highlight opportunities to improve performance. And remember that testing your design and your content are equally important.

How to figure out conversion rate

To figure out your email conversion rate, divide the number of conversions by the total number of email opens, then multiply by 100.

When measuring conversion rates, consider the time window for conversion attribution, the impact of multi-touch attribution models, and how different segments perform. Pay special attention to the disparity between mobile and desktop conversion rates, as this often reveals opportunities for optimization.

How does email design affect your conversion rates?

Your email design does more than make your message look pretty—it’s actively working to either convert readers or drive them away. Each visual element shapes how readers respond to your content, from the moment they first see your email to their decision to click through.

A cluttered email design immediately signals complexity, while a clean, purposeful layout invites engagement. If readers can’t quickly find what matters to them, they’re unlikely to take any action at all.

Even subtle design choices like the contrast of your CTA button or the breathing room around key messages can make the difference between a conversion and a missed opportunity.

Mobile responsiveness adds another critical layer – with over 60% of emails now opened on phones, your conversion success depends heavily on how your design adapts to smaller screens. What converts beautifully on desktop can become a conversion killer on mobile if your design isn’t thoughtfully optimized.

This understanding of design’s impact on conversion sets the foundation for the specific best practices we’ll explore next.

Email Design Best Practices for Marketing Conversion

So how can you leverage your email design to create a great first impression and promote marketing conversion?

1. Have a clear CTA

A call-to-action button is essential.

When it comes to user experience, the first thing people notice is how easily it is to find what they’re looking for. A visible CTA that emphasizes it’s interactive with a bold colour scheme. This allows users to effortlessly continue through their email journey.

Quick tip: Make your CTA text active and pressing like “Start your 30-day trial” rather than “Click to visit our site.”

2. Use optimal positioning

Eye tracking studies have shown that people scan content in the shape of an “F.” Building your design to suit this pattern is the best way to ensure that even if the customer is skimming through your content, they will consume the important parts.

Even with principles like this in mind, you should always test your strategies. Test with your internal employees, test with your customers, and test with your friends and family. The better you understand how people read and use your email format, the more you can optimize it for conversions.

3. Understand the importance of color

Colors are powerful psychological triggers that can make or break your conversion rates. Each color choice in your email sends subtle but important signals to your readers. But it’s not just about picking colors you like—it’s about using them strategically to guide action.

Your brand colors should anchor your email design while allowing key elements like CTAs to stand out through strategic contrast. For instance, using your primary brand color for body content while reserving a complementary accent color for buttons can create a natural visual hierarchy that drives clicks.

Beyond just memorizing your brand’s hex codes, create a simple color hierarchy system. Use your primary colors for branding, your secondary colors for section differentiation, and your accent colors for conversion elements. This systematic approach ensures both brand consistency and conversion optimization.

4. Make your images work for you

Every image in your email should work toward your conversion goal. Whether it’s a product shot that highlights key features or a lifestyle photo that shows your product in action, each visual element needs to earn its place. Pay special attention to image placement—it should naturally guide your reader’s eye through your email’s story and toward your call-to-action.

Quick tip: Most marketers know how important it is to personalize content. But did you know you can also personalize images? The right email marketing solution will allow you to use user behavior data to automatically serve images that they’ve already show an interest in. This creates great upselling and cross-selling opportunities.

5. Use white space to your advantage

Email design best practices require an adequate amount of white space around your CTA button to signal its importance. The resulting email is not only pleasant to look at, but also increases the reader’s comprehension. It is about time people stopped calling it “negative” space, eh?

Strategic white space isn’t just about aesthetics—it’s about making your content scannable and your CTAs unmissable. Use generous padding around important elements to boost their visual impact, and don’t be afraid to let key messages breathe. Sometimes the most effective way to highlight something is to isolate it with space.

6. Include directional cues

Directional cues are a simple yet effective way of guiding the reader to the most important part of your email. These visual guides can be subtle: an arrow pointing to a key benefit, a photo with a person’s gaze directed toward your CTA, or even the natural flow of your design elements. When done well, these cues create an intuitive path through your content that naturally leads to conversion.

The key is consistency across your entire campaign. The visual language you establish in your emails should align with your landing pages and other marketing materials, creating a seamless journey that keeps your reader oriented and confident in taking the next step.

7. Implement a visual hierarchy

Creating a strong visual hierarchy guides readers through your content in a deliberate sequence. By carefully structuring your text sizes, weight, colors, and spacing, you control which elements grab attention first and how the eye moves through your email. Every design choice should serve your conversion goal, ensuring important messages and CTAs capture attention even at a glance.

Remember that most recipients will skim rather than read every word. Your hierarchy should work double-duty: It should deliver your complete message to careful readers while ensuring scanners still catch the main points. Strategic use of headers, bold text, and supporting images means even a quick glance can convey your core message and desired action.

8. Above the Fold

While most people today are comfortable with scrolling, those first moments after opening your email are critical. The viewport—what readers see before scrolling—needs to capture attention and communicate value immediately. Your most compelling content, key benefits, and primary CTA should appear here, where they can make an instant impact.

Think of your above-the-fold content as both a complete message and an invitation to explore further. A reader who never scrolls should grasp your core message and value proposition, while those who continue should feel naturally drawn into your complete story. This dual-purpose approach ensures maximum impact regardless of how your audience engages with your email.

Your email design isn’t just about aesthetics—it’s a powerful conversion tool that starts working the moment your reader opens your message. By implementing these best practices thoughtfully, you can create emails that don’t just look good, but actively guide your readers toward conversion.

Want to learn more about increasing email conversions with Maropost? Get a demo.