An email marketing campaign is only as effective as its email subject line. If you’re hoping to make impressions that will drive sales for your small business, your make-or-break moment is truly in the subject line, where readers will determine whether they want to keep reading or immediately archive your offer. So, if you’re planning to make email campaigns part of the digital marketing strategy for your small business, you need to learn how to write effective email subject lines that drive results.
Here at Hyport Digital, we put a lot of time and effort into learning the value and strategy behind effective digital marketing, and, at the end of the day, we write a lot of email subject lines. Keep reading for our best insight into email subject lines that truly drive conversions.
The Power of the Email Subject Line
When you craft an email marketing strategy, you plan to create an irresistible offer, worded with just the right amount of information and persuasion to entice your reader to click the right link and make the purchase. But before your beautifully crafted email can be read, it needs to be opened–and that decision will almost always be made based on the quality of your subject line.
In other words, effective email subject lines are the foundation for your entire email marketing strategy. Truly, your subject line will be the difference between your email reaching your audience or landing in the archives. Now that you understand the importance of your email subject line, let’s address the next burning question: how to write an effective email subject line.
Crafting Effective Email Subject Lines
Creating an effective email subject line is part art, part science. Here are some of our latest and greatest tips:
Know Your Audience
Just like any other aspect of digital marketing for small businesses, knowing your audience is half the battle. Personalized subject lines tailored to the recipient can increase open rates significantly. Remember who your product or service is for, and speak to their interest.
Keep it Short and Sweet
Concise, direct email subject lines tend to outperform their wordier counterparts, partly because there’s only so much room for a subject line in a customer’s inbox. Aim for 50 characters or less to ensure your entire subject line shows up in a user’s inbox. Your email subject line might be the perfect, well-crafted hook, but if your audience can’t understand the full idea, they won’t be interested.
Stimulate Curiosity
Intrigue the reader by posing a question or offering a tantalizing piece of information, but be careful to not give everything away. You want them to open the email to find out more. Think of your email subject line as the joke, and the rest of the email as the punchline.
Show the Benefit
What’s in it for the reader? Convey the value they’ll get out of reading your email. If they know what to expect, they’ll be more likely to open the email. This can be difficult to do in a quick, 50-character subject line, but a good way to sneak the value in is to focus on the verb you use. Do you offer spa services? Use a verb like “refresh” or “rejuvenate.” Using vivid verbs is an easy way to get the reader to picture themselves in the world where they’ve purchased your product–making them understand how much better that world is!
Use Urgency
Deadline-driven subject lines create a sense of urgency, encouraging the reader to act quickly. Especially if you’re pairing your email marketing campaign with a limited-time offer, you should make the timeline clear from the very first impression.
Test and Optimize
Keep testing different approaches to email subject lines to find what works best for your audience, and always aim for continuous optimization. If you’d like a way to test your email subject line before sending it off to your potential customers, you can use a free email subject line grader online, like this option by Net Atlantic.
Conclusion
Now that you understand both the value of and the strategy behind effective email subject lines, you’re ready to harness the power of email marketing to maximize your marketing efforts and boost your business! If you have any questions about your email marketing strategy or digital marketing strategy, or if you’d like to benefit from our professional email marketing services, contact us at Hyport Digital today. We’re ready to help you make the most of your marketing!
