Black Friday is a great chance to boost your sales with a well-designed newsletter. But how can you make your newsletter stand out from the rest and get recipients to take action?

In this article, we’ll give you some great tips on how to make your newsletter design really pop for Black Friday. We’ll walk you through the steps of putting together a winning email campaign using a range of styles, from classic, eye-catching layouts to minimalist designs.

Many brands rely on eye-catching colors and a clear visual hierarchy for a typical Black Friday newsletter design. Black is the classic color that’s instantly associated with Black Friday. If you want your Black Friday layout to be a real head-turner, you should use these design elements:

It’s totally fine and pretty much standard practice to mix things up a bit, like changing the newsletter design, even the colors, for special events like Black Friday. But don’t lose sight of who you are as a brand. When your recipients open your email, they should immediately recognize who it’s from. For example, if you change the brand colors in your newsletter, you should keep the logo the same.

Black is obviously the go-to color for Black Friday design. Even if a lot of other brands also use a dark layout, it still offers a high recognition value for Black Friday. Don’t worry, you don’t need to make your newsletter all black. If you’re looking to give your newsletter that classic Black Friday look, try just coloring individual elements dark:

• Background of individual content areas
• Header image
• Product images
• Call-to-action buttons

Tip: Instead of pure black (#000000), use a slight color gradient with a very dark gray, blue, or red. This creates a more pleasing visual experience on the web and provides a smooth transition to the lighter colors of the rest of the email. The same applies to white (#FFFFFF). Here, too, a slight color gradation is more visually pleasing.

If you want to try something new, combine dark tones with modern colors or shiny accents. Neon colors are absolutely on trend right now and look great with plain black.

For Black Friday, Parfümerie Pieper uses a classic newsletter design with a black header and footer and pink as the contrasting color.
[Newsletter sent with CleverReach 🧡]

Tip: You can add several brand designs to CleverReach and use them in newsletters or forms. On top of your usual corporate design, it’s a smart move to have your own brand’s design ready for Black Friday. This gives you the freedom to switch up your Black Friday designs and manage everything in one place.

Including a countdown in your newsletter design reinforces the sense of urgency and limited time of your offers. The timer counts down to the end of your offer and gets readers to act quickly. Put it somewhere in the newsletter that’ll really catch people’s attention, like in the top header area or right after the welcome message.

Luis Treckner makes their Black Weekend Sale pop with a cool countdown in the upper visible area of the Black-Friday newsletter.
[Newsletter sent with CleverReach 🧡]

Good to know: The CleverReach newsletter editor has a built-in countdown feature that you can drag and drop into any spot in the newsletter. Set the date, customize the design, and you’re all set!

Large call-to-action buttons (CTAs) and eye-catching text and image elements are key to getting recipients to pay attention and click. There’s a lot of competition in the inbox during Black Friday, so your message—most often a discount offer—has to stand out.

Use big, bold fonts for discount promos and contrast the CTAs with the background colors. This will get your recipients’ attention right away.

The Gemini online store uses eye-catching images and colors in its CTA buttons for its offers.
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GIFs and interactive elements can take your Black Friday newsletter design to a new level! Instead of static images, they bring movement and energy, which works really well at an event like Black Friday. We’ve already got the countdown element set, so what else is there?

GIFs get people’s attention right away and liven up your newsletter. You could use an animated GIF in the header that shows discounts lighting up, for example, to visually highlight your offer. This small tweak makes it more likely that the person opening the email will take a closer look, which in turn makes it more likely that they’ll click something in your newsletter.

In this example, Oatsome uses an animated banner to draw the user’s attention to the Black Friday offer.

Not only are GIFs great for advertising, but they’re also a cool way to show off your products. Animations and effects are a great way to make your products stand out and get your advertising message across.

A simple GIF of the product animation grabs attention and makes people notice Suri’s discounted toothbrush.

Tip: Just make sure the GIF isn’t too distracting and doesn’t mess up the overall look of the newsletter. Also, keep in mind that the file size matters. If your file is too big, the GIF might not display right in some email clients. So, just double-check that the GIF still works in a static state — that way you’ll be on the safe side.

If you add an interactive element to your newsletter that invites recipients to participate, you can boost interaction. For example, the user could click on a button or an image to “unlock” an exclusive offer.

In this example, True Classic uses an animated GIF as a header graphic to get people to click. You have to click on the image to see the offer.

An interactive wheel of fortune integrated as a GIF with a link to your store or offer landing page brings gamification to your newsletter and encourages clicks.

GIFs are ideal for depicting the classic wheel of fortune. The link takes you to a landing page with a specific offer, as in the example from S. Oliver.

A newsletter doesn’t have to be long and filled with lots of products. Especially on Black Friday, it’s best to keep it brief and focus on the essentials. In most cases, less is more, especially when you’re running a discount promotion and have a clear call to action.

A minimalist design with a clear, unambiguous message, such as “Black Friday Sale: 50% off all products,” and a direct call-to-action button, such as “Get it now!,” ensures recipients immediately understand what to do. Avoid design elements that are unnecessary and could distract the user from the main message. A minimalist design with ample white space — or, in this case, “black space” — and a clear structure enables you to focus on the essentials: Your offer.

The website builder plugin Elementor Pro relies on a simple, minimalist newsletter design for Black Friday.

Another way to design a successful Black Friday newsletter is to highlight certain products or product categories. This is especially helpful if your Black Friday campaign is centered around a specific product.

Use high-quality images that will make the offer look good. Clear, concise text and well-structured buttons make it easy for the audience to see the product right away.

In this newsletter example, MoEa shows a targeted product with a catchy header graphic.

You can make the newsletter more relevant and increase the likelihood of a purchase by using personalized product recommendations. These recommendations are based on the recipient’s previous behavior.

Not every company offers discounts on Black Friday. Some brands choose not to offer discounts. They’re open about this. This strategy is especially popular with customers who don’t like the consumer frenzy and are looking for brands that are good for the environment.

Explain clearly why you are not offering discounts. No matter what your strategy is—whether it’s related to sustainability or something else—being authentic is key. A design that follows the brand’s guidelines without a standard Black Friday layout shows your company’s position and makes your newsletter stand out from the typical Black Friday emails in terms of looks.

A typical Black Friday newsletter? Not with Koro. The company deliberately sets itself apart from the typical Black Friday design.

But you can also do the opposite: You can go with the classic Black Friday design to create the impression of a Black Friday discount campaign. You only mention the discount in the content, not in the title.

Fritz Kola plays with the idea of Black Friday and flips it around.
[Newsletter sent with CleverReach 🧡]

No matter what approach you pick, there are some basic design tips that are important for all Black Friday newsletters:

• Responsive Design: Optimized for Every Device

Make sure your newsletter looks good on all devices, especially on mobile devices. Since a lot of people check their emails on their phones, it’s important that your design looks good on any screen size.

Tip: Check out the mobile preview right in the newsletter editor before you send it out. Then you can test out the newsletter design in real-world conditions by sending a test email.

If you want to be extra cautious, you can also do a design and spam test for your newsletter. This will automatically test your newsletter design in the most common email clients, saving you from having to do manual testing. At the same time, you’ll get info on potential spam risks.

• Accessible Newsletter Design

The Accessibility Improvement Act (BFSG) has been in force since June 2025. The law includes accessibility requirements for digital products and services. This includes newsletters, which are a form of accessible communication with your customers.

The good news: accessible newsletter design is simple. The CleverReach Accessibility Tests allow you to test your newsletters for over 40 accessibility criteria at the touch of a button and receive specific tips for improvement. The email templates that come with the editor are already accessible.

• A/B Tests: Find out What Works

Test different layouts and call-to-actions. A/B tests allow you to find out which design or layout is best received by your target group. You can use this data to keep improving your campaign and get better results.

Good to know: You can do A/B tests for the newsletter design or content in CleverReach using the automation tool.

• Fast Loading Times: Avoid Technical Hurdles

Try to avoid big image files and too many animated elements that could make the newsletter take too long to load. If you make a newsletter that’s quick, it’ll probably be less likely to get flagged as spam, and people will have a better experience. Plus, you’ll see a lower bounce rate.

• Balanced Text-to-Image Ratio

If your newsletter is just images, there’s a higher chance it’ll get flagged as spam. So, make sure your text-to-image ratio is at least 60:40.

• Visual Clarity: Clear Structure for Easy Decisions

Go for a clean and structured design. Make sure there’s enough white space and that the call-to-action buttons are in a good spot so that your recipients quickly understand what they need to do. A clear structure helps your offers be seen and understood.

CleverReach provides a selection of free, professionally designed newsletter templates so you don’t have to start from scratch with your Black Friday newsletter design. The designs are specially tailored for Black Friday and Cyber Monday, with eye-catching call-to-action buttons and discount banners.

You can select the templates directly in the newsletter tool, customize them, and fill them with your own offers, images, and text. This saves you time with the layout and makes sure everything looks modern and consistent, which gets your recipients excited to shop.

If you want to design a successful newsletter for Black Friday, you need to be creative, clear, and focused on the people you’re sending it to. No matter if you like a classic design that’s full of eye-catching elements like countdowns and GIFs or if you’re more into a simple, minimalist style, the key is to clearly communicate your offers and give users a great experience.

With a smart design plan, you can make your Black Friday newsletter pop and get your subscribers to take action.

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