enewsworks:
managed electronic communications for customer loyalty and retention

QUICK LINKS:

• UK FBI risks abandoning e-crime victims

From silicon.com

• Business bites the blogging bullet

• Carphone Warehouse's internet foray

Competition grows in the UK home broadband market

• Robot Football World Cup

Never mind that other World Cup, let's hear it for the engineers!

Good subject lines get your emails opened

These days, all email marketers seem to talk about is 'deliverability'. The fight back against spam has led to a situation where even legitimate marketers face many barriers to their messages being read.

But there's one barrier the sender still has control over, and that's the subject line. It doesn't matter how much trouble you go to to ensure your emails get through, if recipients don't open then your campaign is dead in the water.

Two things can trigger the urge to delete without opening: the 'from' field and the subject line. (I'll talk about the 'from' field in a future eTips.) With so much power vested in so few words, it's amazing how often the subject line is treated as an afterthought, something to consider once all the exciting creative work has been done. So what makes a good subject line? Whatever gets your emails opened - which means testing, testing and more testing. Different approaches work for different audiences, but here are a few general guidelines:

• Including your company name can increase recognition and trust. With so much spam about, the quicker you can reduce suspicion the better
• Keep it short and put the important words near the beginning. Subject lines get truncated in different email clients
• Give a reason for opening. You want the recipient to immediately think 'there's something inside I want'. You can put the whole offer in the subject line, (such as "2 for 1 this weekend only") or just a teaser ("Fantastic deals this weekend"). It's worth testing both approaches to see which gets a better response from your audience
• Check spelling and punctuation before sending. Sounds basic, but these kinds of errors at best reflect badly on your credibility and at worst scream 'spam'

Thanks for reading! Until next time



Robin Houghton



Feedback? Comments? drop me an email.

Copyright © 2006 enewsworks and
Robin Houghton Communications Ltd

Have you been forwarded this email?
CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE to fortnightly email marketing tips