Dec 10, 2014

Use Strong Email Subject Lines to Boost Open Rates in 2015

If some or most of your sales grow out of email offers to prospective clients, you know better than most how hard it is simply to get someone’s attention. A recent analysis of five million emails by the email management service Baydin found that on average, a typical email user gets 147 messages a day and deletes 71 of them (48%). That means there’s great pressure on the email subject line to achieve one single overriding goal: Get the recipient to open your email. With the right strategies, your email subject lines can do a lot of the heavy lifting (sales-wise) up-front. Here are six tips to keep in mind:

Keep the subject line at 50 characters or less. Not only does this address our collectively short attention span, anything longer may get cut off, depending on the device being used to read it.

Instill a sense of urgency. Attention-grabbing words like “Important” and “Urgent” suggest to readers that your message is worth taking a look at. Other impactful action words include “Get,” “Watch,” and “Save.” Always use action words to give your email recipients a clear sense of what to do next. At the same time, avoid the use of ALL CAPS, as this conveys desperation, not a professional sales approach.

Focus on what’s in it for your readers. Your product’s benefit to customers should always be front and center.

Use numbers. Readers are drawn to numbers and lists. When a subject line says, “5 Tips to Get More from Your Employees,” email recipients get a sense of just how long it will take to read the message. It also suggests the likelihood they’ll find at least one tip worth remembering.

Avoid spam triggers. As enticing as the use of “Free!” looks in your draft email subject line, it should be avoided. Not only is it likely to get your email buried in a spam folder, but, says content marketing strategist Lindsay Kolowich, “Words like ‘Free,’ ‘Following up,’ ‘Help,’ and “Reminder’ rub today’s intelligent consumer the wrong way.”

Personalize the “From” field. Prospective customers are naturally wary of anonymous or ambiguous names in an email’s “From” field. Whenever possible, sales reps are better off including their first name and company name, so people have some sense of who this great, unique, fantastic sales offer is coming from.

A successful sale begins with a subject line that captures a prospect’s attention and gets them to open your email. That’s why what gets written in the subject line is just as important as the offer itself.