The perfect subject line?

The subject line is usually the first aspect of your email the recipient will see! Although there is no “Golden Rule” to subject line writing that will enable you to catch the attention of all your recipients, there are a few simple hints and tips that will improve the overall success of your campaign…

Keep it short…

If the subject line appears to be longer than the actual email itself, there is a good chance that the recipient won’t have the time to read it and will scan their inbox for something shorter, snappier and more to the point.

Think about the types of devices that your email will be read on – many mobile devices for example will only display the first 35 characters of your subject line so try and be as careful as possible and get your message across clearly in as few characters as you can!

Use a call to action...

In many situations (depending on the campaign) it can be useful to tell your recipients what you want them to do in the subject line, people tend to be a lot more receptive when they are asked (or told) what you'd like them to do next. You know exactly what the ideal result of your campaign would be, now all you need to do is to make it as clear as possible, from the start, using under 35 characters… Simple!

Test, test and test again!

Nobody knows your customers better than you do, but no two customers are ever the same. What convinces one person to open your email might be the exact thing that causes another to unsubscribe…

A/B testing is a great way to discover what work’s best for the majority of your database or subscriber list. You can segment your database to create a test list, which the varying subject lines will be sent to and based on the results you can decide which was most impactful. Once this has been tested time and time again you will know exactly what works well and how to repeat success…

Do questions work?

A study explained in this infographic suggests that subject lines framed as questions perform better than those formulated as statements - do you agree?

Just remember to consider the wants, needs and interests of your recipients and construct an interesting question that will grab their attention and make them want to know the answer.

Personalisation...

One of the best ways to catch the attention of your recipients is to be as personable as possible..

Personalisation heavily involves the data you hold about your recipients such as: their name, location, buying behaviours and birthday. The more data you can collect about individuals, the more personal your emails will be…

The subject line of your campaign needs to make each recipient feel like it has been sent to them specifically and not just a mass email shot that has been sent to everyone.

This combined with perfect timing and interesting content will vastly improve the open rate, click rate and conversion rate of your campaigns.