Design Lab

July 17, 2023

Module 2 — Lesson 8

The Design Lab can be overwhelming at first.

(I mean when was the last time you let your inner Picasso shine?)

In all seriousness, it’s about experimentation.

  1. Envision a general idea of what you want your newsletter to look like

  2. Play around with the editor to create your masterpiece

  3. Keep modifying and iterating as you go

💡 Pro Tip: What newsletters do you consistently open and read? What design do they use? Can you pull inspiration from their newsletter and add what’s uniquely your own to create something new?

How it works

5 Email Design Best Practices

While email design is very specific to your brand — there are a few best practices the top newsletters in the world follow. You don’t need to use all of these tips, these are simply suggestions.

1) Introduce a background color

Most newsletters stick with a white background and black text. There’s nothing wrong with that (it’s the status quo for a reason), but adding a subtle background color is another technique to stand out in the inbox.

Here’s a quick example:

Where do most people go wrong with this? They make the background color too strong.

Can you read that without squinting?

Remember, optimize for readability!

2) Style your content breaks

You know what’s the most boring thing on planet Earth?

A solid straight line.

You know what many newsletters use to break their content up?

That’s right… a solid straight line.

So what can you do instead?

Use beehiiv’s dashed or dotted content breaks instead:

It’s a subtle difference, but it adds flavor to your newsletter that frankly, a solid straight line could never add.

(Sorry solid straight line, it isn’t personal).

Want to get even fancier?

You can create image-based content breaks by adding your image in the content editor and creating a template like the one shown above (but more on this later).

Now, let’s go on.

3) Use background colors to emphasize quotes

Here’s another advanced design tip… use background colors to emphasize quotes.

Jack Raines’ newsletter Young Money has a green-colored theme. So adding a subtle green background helps:

  • It stands out

  • Build his world

  • Keep readers engaged

You can change the background color of your quotes by going to:

Settings → Design Lab → Block quotes (Variant 1) → Background Color

💡 Pro Tip: Use a light, subtle color to not distract from the quote itself.

4) Add a custom footer

Many newsletters skip customizing their footer because they believe it’s irrelevant.

But the truth?

Your footer is the last thing your readers see before exiting your newsletter. It’s free real estate to:

  1. Plug your social media links

  2. Sell your offers (affiliates, products, upsells, etc.)

Here are two examples from World Builders and Morning Brew:

5) Optimize For Readability

💡 Pro Tip: Don’t forget your end goal is optimizing readability.

Again, don’t overdo it. Sometimes the best design is minimal design.

Whatever you choose, spend an extra 15 minutes nailing your design now to save you 15 hours of switching back and forth later.

Happy designing! :)

P.S. If you want to see exactly how to accomplish these in beehiiv, check out the video below:

Additional Resources

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