When running an email marketing campaign, the first challenge you face is getting people to actually read your emails. Without a decent open rate, your campaign won’t have a chance to succeed. That’s why it’s imperative that you understand how to write compelling subject lines that simply beg to be clicked.
• #1: Keep on testing—MarketingSherpa.com performed a recent survey in which they found that 40% of email marketers had high impacts on the return on investment (ROI) by testing their subject lines. Testing is the only way to what does and doesn’t work for your campaign. Take your findings, and continually optimize your subject lines to be the best they can be.
• #2: Give them a reason to read—If you want people to actually open your email, you need to give them a reason. Focus your subject line on a benefit that resonates with the reader. It can be something as simple as “Save 50% In Store Saturday Only.” What you don’t want to have is a dull subject line like “ABC Newsletter.” Be specific and clear in delivering a benefit in your subject line.
• #3: Deliver what your selling—Want to instantly lose credibility? You can do it by promising one thing in your subject line and doing another in the body of your email. The subject line and email message have to be related.
• #4: Avoid Spam—Some email marketers shoot themselves in the foot by writing subject lines that immediately get flagged as spam. What can you do to avoid writing a subject line that won’t be flagged? First, don’t write your headlines in ALL CAPS LIKE THIS. Second, don’t use excessive punctuation like this!!!!!! Lastly, avoid using gimmicky words like: free, make millions, amazing, miracle, etc.
• #5: Shorter the Better—Why should you keep your subject lines to 50 characters or less? Because if they’re any longer, they could get cut off by your readers’ email carriers. Studies show that most people only read the first few words of email subject lines, so a long headline probably won’t get read fully.
If you follow these simple rules next time you begin an email campaign you WILL see a dramatic jump in your open rate and probably ROI.
