Look, I’ll be blunt. If you’re sending emails to your customers and you haven’t checked how they look on an iPhone or a Samsung lately, you’re probably burning cash.
I was sitting with a bloke who runs a decent-sized landscaping business out in Samford last week. He’s doing everything right—good crews, solid word of mouth, and he’s actually building a database. He showed me his latest newsletter. On his big office monitor, it looked like a masterpiece. Pictures of turf, fancy stone walls, the lot.
Then I opened it on my phone.
It was a disaster. The text was so small I needed a magnifying glass. The 'Book a Quote' button was tucked away in a corner, and every time I tried to tap it with my thumb, I accidentally clicked a link to his Instagram instead.
He’s not alone. About 70% of your customers are reading your emails while they’re waiting for a coffee, sitting on the train, or hiding in the bathroom for five minutes of peace. If your email is hard to read or the buttons don’t work on a thumb-tap, they don’t 'save it for later.' They delete it.
The 'Fat Thumb' Test
We’ve all been there. You try to click a link on a website and you end up hitting something else entirely. It’s frustrating. For your business, it’s fatal.
When people are on their phones, they aren't using a precise mouse cursor. They’re using a thumb. If your links are bunched up together, or your 'Call Now' button is too small, you’re making it hard for people to give you money.
I tell our clients to follow the 'Fat Thumb' rule. Every button or link you want someone to click needs to be big. At least 45 pixels high, if you want the technical bit, but basically, if you can’t hit it easily with your thumb while walking, it’s too small.
And for heaven's sake, give your links some breathing room. Don't stack three different links on top of each other. Space them out so even someone with hands like a catcher's mitt can get to the right page.
Stop Sending 'Wall of Text' Emails
On a desktop, a long paragraph looks professional. On a phone, it looks like a chore.
When someone opens your email on a mobile, they’re skimming. They want to know three things: 1. Who is this? 2. What do they want? 3. What do I do next?
If they see a massive block of text, their brain shuts down. We’ve seen this time and time again with email marketing making money versus just making noise. The ones that make money use short sentences. One-sentence paragraphs. Plenty of white space.
It feels weird to write like that at first. You feel like you're not being 'professional.' But trust me, your customers will thank you for it by actually reading what you sent.
Images Are Killing Your Results
Here is a mistake I see almost every day: putting all your important info inside a big, beautiful graphic.
Think about the last time you were out and about with dodgy reception. You open an email and... nothing. Just white boxes. Most phones don't load images automatically to save data.
If your 'Special Offer' or your phone number is stuck inside an image that doesn't load, you’ve sent a blank email. Congratulations, you just paid to annoy your customers.
Always make sure your main point—your offer, your price, your contact info—is written in plain text. Images should be the garnish, not the steak. If the images don't load, the email should still make sense and still allow the customer to take action.
The Subject Line is Your Only Chance
On a computer, you can see quite a bit of the subject line. On a phone? You get about 30 characters before it gets cut off.
If you start your subject line with 'Monthly Newsletter from [Business Name] - Issue 42', the only thing the customer sees on their lock screen is 'Monthly Newsletter fr...'.
Boring. Deleted.
Put the value right at the front. '20% Off All Services' or 'Your Quote is Ready' or 'Quick question about your roof.' You need to give them a reason to tap.
I’ve seen businesses double their open rates just by moving the important words to the start of the sentence. It costs zero dollars to do this, but the impact on your bottom line is massive.
What’s the Real Cost of Getting This Wrong?
You might think, 'Oh, it’s just an email, it doesn't matter that much.'
But think about the math. If you send an email to 1,000 people and 500 open it on their phones, but 400 of them find it too hard to read and close it immediately, you’ve just lost 40% of your potential sales because you didn't check a mobile preview.
When we talk about email platform costs, we aren't just talking about the monthly subscription fee. We’re talking about the lost revenue from bad delivery and poor design. If you're paying $50 a month for a platform but it's sending emails that nobody can read on a phone, that's the most expensive $50 you'll ever spend.
How to Test It Without Being a Tech Genius
You don't need fancy software to do this.
Before you hit 'send' to your whole list, send a test email to yourself. Then, do three things: 1. Open it on your phone. 2. Turn your phone sideways (landscape) and see if it breaks. 3. Try to click every link using only your thumb.
If it feels clunky, fix it. If you have to pinch and zoom to read the text, it’s too small. Most of the time, your email software will have a 'mobile' setting. Use it. Make the font size at least 16px. Make the buttons wide.
Don't Forget the 'After the Click'
This is where a lot of people fall over. They spend all this time making the email look great on a phone, the customer clicks the button, and then... they land on a website that doesn't work on phones.
If I click a 'Book Now' button in an email and I end up on a desktop website where I have to scroll left and right to find the form, I’m gone.
Your marketing is a chain. If one link is broken, the whole thing fails. Make sure your website works on phones just as well as your email does. If it doesn't, you're just paying to send people to a dead end.
The Bottom Line
Marketing isn't about being fancy. It’s about making it as easy as possible for a customer to say 'yes' and give you money.
In 2024, the path of least resistance is a mobile-friendly email. It’s not a 'nice to have.' It’s the bare minimum.
If you’re worried that your emails are just landing in spam or being ignored because they look like rubbish on a phone, it might be time to take a proper look at your setup.
Stop worrying about 'branding' and start worrying about 'usability.' A plain text email that works on a phone will beat a fancy graphic email that doesn't, every single day of the week.
If you want a hand making sure your emails are actually turning into phone calls and bookings, give us a shout at Local Marketing Group. We’ll skip the jargon and just help you make more money.