A client of mine once called an email I wrote for them “ugly,” so I challenged them to an A/B split test.
I said, “Use the exact same copy, but pass it over to your designer. We’ll send both versions at the same time to half your list (about 375,000 each way) with the same subject line, and if mine wins, you owe me a beer.”
“Deal,” he said, before adding, “but if I win, you forfeit your bill next quarter, Mr Expert.” He said it playfully, but I could tell he was trying to patronise me.
Two weeks later, his designer finally finishes his mega-project. It looked like a £10,000 sales page, not an email. But it was beautiful… and I knew instantly they didn’t stand a chance.
Four days after it went out, the split test concluded. Here are the metrics:
Their email:
Open Rate: 29.2% (104,448)
Click-Through Rate (CTOR): 0.74% (772)
Unsubscribes: 0.81% (2,897)
Spam Complaints: 0.09% (322)
My email:
Open Rate: 28.9% (103,375)
Click-Through Rate (CTOR): 1.36% (1,406)
Unsubscribes: 0.42% (1,502)
Spam Complaints: 0.02% (71)
The client was shocked.
My “ugly” email pulled almost double the clicks, with half the unsubscribes and a fraction of the spam complaints, despite nearly identical open rates.
And the reason for that is actually pretty fascinating.
Picture this:
Your brand spent weeks building that gorgeous email template.
Custom fonts. Branded colors. Buttons styled to perfection. Graphics laid out just right. Beautiful header image. Footer links all aligned. The whole thing looks like it belongs in a design magazine.
And nobody reads it.
They open it. Glance at the pretty pictures. Then close it faster than a microwave door after the beep goes off.
Because here’s the thing most companies miss…
That beautiful design is actually killing your sales.
“Ugly” emails outsell pretty ones by 84%. And that’s coming from a test that was sent to a relatively unengaged and completely unsegmented list. I imagine the results could hit upwards of 300% if targeting is taken into consideration.
But that’s besides the point.
For now, I just want you to think about the last time you opened an email that looked like a fancy billboard.
You probably looked at the images and scrolled past the words without reading a single sentence. Your brain already decided what it was. Another sales pitch. Another company trying too hard. Another email you don’t need to read because the pictures already told you everything.
The saying goes “don’t judge a book by its cover”, but that’s exactly what people do with emails. Pretty design equals sales pitch. Sales pitch equals instant delete. It happens so fast you don’t even realise you’re doing it.
But plain text emails are different. They force your reader to actually read. There’s nothing else to look at. No buttons to click without thinking. No images to scan instead of reading your words. Just your message staring them in the face. And if your hook is strong enough to grab them in that first line, it’s game over. They’re locked in.
The psychology makes perfect sense once you see it. Too many colours scatter attention. Images pull focus away from your actual point. All that beautiful design is basically handing your reader a dozen reasons not to pay attention to your words.
It’s like showing up to an interview expecting your nice suit to get you the job.
So what happens when you strip all that away and make them read?
They actually read.
Wild concept, I know. But here’s where this gets useful for your team:
Our Email Marketing Masterclass teaches you exactly how to write hooks that grab people from line one. The kind that make ugly emails work like magic. But it also gives you the full picture – there’s an entire module (over 3 hours) on design training and psychology. You’ll learn about eye movement patterns. When design actually helps. When it hurts. How to use it without letting it murder your message.
Because sometimes design works. You just need to know when and why.
Your team gets lifetime access to all of it. Plus live coaching calls 3 to 6 times every week. No subscriptions or retainers. Just full on lifetime access to a network of marketing geniuses who get results.
Later gator
Kav “Plain Text” Legacy
Boost open rates