There are more than 100 billion emails sent every day. So, how do you set yours apart from the others? We’re here to help you understand what makes a winning email and show you how to effectively break through the clutter.   Your Subject Line Is Your First Impression                                          This is your digital handshake. A bad handshake leaves a bad first impression in human interactions, so stiffen up. Your email might have amazing content (don’t worry, we’ll get to that too) but you have to leave a good first impression before they read on. Here are four easy tips to help craft an intriguing subject line: 1. Make your subject line relevant and specific

• “Here Is Something That Will Get Your Business Ahead”
• “A Must Have Email Template for Growing Business”

Which one would you open? Set expectations about what the reader will be getting, and avoid vagueness – it comes off, well, spammy. That makes the second subject line our winner. 2. Keep it short and simple 3. Add a call-to-action 4. If you have a number, use it.

• The shorter the headline the better. When you’re on your mobile phone, less of the subject line appears. Our advice, keep it under 24 characters.

• Everyone knows emails are sent for a purpose. So tell the reader what the purpose of the email is in the subject line. Are they downloading something? Entering a contest? Getting a coupon?
• Should your subject line be super short (less than 24 characters) in our opinion YES, as long as you get the message across. “Blog Tips for Banks!” (that is only 19). “Banks & Blogs!” (that is 14).
• A/B test subject lines and call-to-actions to get a more accurate feel for what your consumer likes and responds to. Monitor the open rate to see which the winner is.

• This can be applied to more than just a sale. “50% off the entire store” or “20 Tips to Improve Work Life Balance”.

  Let Your Content Live Up To The Hype Here’s the deal, you’re sending an email because you want your customers to know about something valuable. If you don’t think it carries value, then you probably shouldn’t send it. After all you don’t want to piss anyone off, that leads to spam flags and unsubscribes. Follow these tips to craft content that people will care about: 1. Be informative

• Give your customer something worthwhile. Think about what they want and not what you want. We all know you want to increase your sales, but what will the customer want from you?
• Don’t bait and switch them. What you are offering in the email must be the truth. Don’t say they will get an e-Book for Best Practices and then sell yourself in the e-Book.

2. Be clear and concise

• Don’t worry, you can use more than 24 characters here.
• Your email is meant to inspire a reader to click through to your real content.
• Do you read long, drawn out emails or close them? Make sure your email is not going to take much time to read and has that inspiration.
• Share your message in a clean and easy-to-read way that allows a reader to skim through content. Bullet points come in handy for this.
• If you are sending an email to guide someone to a new blog post try to A/B test your content. Should your email have some clever tips as to what they will get from the blog OR should you share the blog intro paragraph and hope they want more? There is only one true way to find out: A/B test. Monitor your click-through-rate to see which the winner is.

Don’t Be Afraid of HTML or Images You’ve probably been warned that most email clients don’t automatically download images, users do. Use them, but put ALT text in place so a reader can preview what the image is or says in the event that a download doesn’t take place. HTML can also keep your emails “pretty” without relying on images all the time – consult a professional before trying this at home though. Include a Reply To Address Ever get frustrated when you can’t send a question back to the company who sent you an email? Then make sure your customers can get back to you. Set a ‘reply to’ email address and make sure it’s monitored. You don’t want to miss an opportunity to connect with a customer: good, bad or ugly. Monitor Your Bounces If you’re seeing a lot of bounces – emails that aren’t getting through – then you should start paying attention to them. You want a high deliverability rate. A mid-to-high 90% rate is healthy. If you see that drop then it’s time to look at your list and clean it up. Maintain an Accurate List Speaking of lists, it’s important to keep a strong and current list. 1. Segmenting

• Make sure you break your list into segments and are sending the relevant content to the right people. A good list and good content will drive conversions and mean less unsubscribes.

2. Marketing Automation

•  If you have good content than you are one step closer to being able to automate it. All you need is a marketing automation software and a dedicated person to implement it. We will dive deeper into Marketing Automation in an upcoming blog article soon.

We wish you happy trails on your next email campaign. Anything can happen though. Like Maximus said, “If you find yourself alone, riding in the green fields with the sun on your face, do not be troubled. For you are in Elysium, and you’re already dead!”   Want more? Sign up to receive the goods via our email newsletter.