5 ways to improve email subject lines

This is the first and the most important step to crafting a good subject line. If you don’t know your audience, then you can’t write anything decent. It doesn’t matter if this is a newsletter you are sending out to hundreds of people, a company-wide announcement for your employees, or a business letter to a potential investor – you must know who you are sending your email to.

In order to do this, make sure to do your research. If you are running an e-commerce store, then you probably have a general idea of who your customers and newsletter subscribers are. But you must not only know but also understand your audience.

Put yourself into their shoes and try to navigate your virtual inbox. Think like your audience would think in their situation. Would they be interested once they barely glance at your subject line? If so, then you are on the right path.

A lot of marketers and entrepreneurs alike keep forgetting about this simple, yet so obvious rule. You must always keep your subject line concise. Your recipient will not be able to see the whole thing before opening your email, and even once they open it, there’s a very small chance they will want to read it till the end. You have a separate space for your email, and there is no need to try and fit in every single point into your subject line. That’s just ridiculous.

Your ideal subject line will be around 50 characters and no more than five words long. This is also due to the fact that most emails are opened on mobile devices, which prevents the user from seeing a subject line that would be seen on a laptop or a personal computer. To fit this limit, try using punchy words that will substitute whole phrases and sentences. The more information you can convey in those five words, the better.

You must never forget that the value your subject line carries must not be reduced because of its length. On the contrary, this limit must be useful to you and help you find the best words for your subject line. If you are looking for synonyms or antonyms, you can use Thesaurus to find those. Sometimes, words that have a similar meaning may have additional features the initial word didn’t have. You also should be careful with spam words in email subjects lines, you can avoid them using Spam Words Checker.

You’ve probably heard of personalization already, so there is no need to explain what that means. It’s a trend, which means most consumers expect you to personalize all of your content no matter what. So, obviously, if you are not doing so, you are basically behind all of your competitors.

A proper personalized subject line directly depends on how well you know your audience. After all, if you know who you are writing to, you will be able to satisfy them in every way possible. But this is just a part of the job.

Your subject line must be personalized in a way that is fitting not only to your recipient but also to your email, your brand, your products, and even your website. For example, achieving a unique website design that will make you stand out of the crowd can be done with the help of Weblizar or a similar designer. Your subject line should correspond with the “mood” of your website and, in turn, with your email. Make your email a kind of a continuation of your subject line and vice versa. This will help you be consistent as well as focused. You also will need localization and translation of some lines in order to make them as relevant as possible especially if you have international business. This can be done using a special translation service, for example, The Word Point.

Your subject line should be active, making people alert instead of making them want to fall asleep. It is a common misconception that leaving your subject line down to the matter is enough to make your recipient convert. On the contrary, you should include an action to prompt them to act themselves. The easiest way to do this is to use verbs. You can still use nouns and even adjectives, but try to focus on verbs to make your subject line more active.

Another thing to keep in mind when trying to achieve a sense of action in your subject line is the urgency you must create. You have a limited-time offer that will be available only for a short period of time. Maybe you have only several items left of a certain product and you will soon be out of stock. It doesn’t matter what it is, but you must always come up with a way to make your email seem like an urgent matter that cannot be left for later. Because if your recipient leaves it to be read later, they will most likely forget about it completely. Make them open it right here and right now.

The last step in creating a successful subject line that converts is to test it out. There are several ways you can do that, but first, you must write down several variants of your subject line. Try to approach the matter from different sides and see how you can change it up. It’s good if you are able to come up with completely different variants, but even if you alter one version a little, it may already make a difference.

Once you have your subject lines ready, test them. One way to do so is A/B testing functionality or a similar tool. Then, check which subject lines worked best and got you the most conversions. In order to understand this, you will probably have to send out more emails than you initially expected to, but these numbers will aid you tremendously.

Alternatively, you can show your subject lines to a friend or colleague to get advice from them. Ask them which ones grab their attention the most. Don’t put words into their mouth though; let them speak for themselves. You can ask a family member too, but they may be more biased and tell you all work well.

Lastly, don’t hesitate to consult an expert. Professional advice can prove to be the most useful, after all. Find an experienced marketer who has enough knowledge about the matter and will be able to tell you which of your subject lines are sure to fail and which may have a chance at success. The most important thing to keep in mind is not to take it all personally and be as objective as possible.