8 WAYS TO MAKE SURE YOUR EMAIL MESSAGE ACTUALLY GETS READ
Understand the objective This seems obvious, but in order to make sure your reader knows what you want them to do, you need to be crystal clear about it. Do you want them to visit your website, or to schedule a one-on-one call? Are you inviting them to an online demo, or are you trying to get them to meet in person? It may be that the goal is to get more information from them, either through direct communication or a survey. If they’re not ready to take a certain step (like scheduling a meeting), do you have a secondary action they can take, like downloading a white paper? Outline your objective before you start crafting the email and you’ll have more chance of success.
Consider where it comes from For both marketing and sales emails, the From address is a key aspect of the equation. Both should come from your organization’s domain rather than a personal address like “sales.person@yahoo.com.” For marketing emails, it’s appropriate to use something generic like “news@yourbizdomain.com.” But a sales email should use a real name. And be sure it’s your full name. Even if your business is just you, you probably shouldn’t send an email from “jane@yourbizdomain.com.” It’s a good way to make sure everyone knows how small your company really is.
Grab their attention A successful subject line is one that stands out in a crowded inbox. It’s one of the reasons why marketers are including symbols (like “Do you marketing?”) in subject lines. But simply getting someone to notice you isn’t enough. You need to communicate some sort of benefit to your reader, and the subject line is a great place to do it. That’s not easy, because your subject line should also be short and to the point as well as accurate about what’s inside. When sending marketing emails, you can always run an A/B test to find out which subject line is the top performer. For a sales email, you can try your own test with different leads in the same organization – or in similar industries – in order to find a proven winner
Get personal Try adding your prospect’s name to the subject line; for many companies, this works very well. Test both first-name-only and first-and-last to see the full range of possibilities. Of course, you’ll want to make sure your sign-up forms ask for this information, so your automated programs can make use of it in the subject line or in the body of the email message. And stick with the name by itself. You never want to deliver something to Mr./ Ms. and risk getting it wrong
Prepare for the preview pane The information that displays in the preview pane is a big part of the reason your message gets opened. Make sure you know how the message will show up in different email clients. Don’t put key messages or the call to action in images only. If the pictures don’t render, or they don’t display correctly (and a lot of preview panes suppress them), your primary message will be lost. Make sure to have your call to action in text as well as a button or banner. When you do use images, adding tailored alt text will encourage your reader to open the email and click to display them.
Keep preheaders and subject lines short and specific The preheader is a short line of text at the top of an email that many email clients display in the preview pane. When images are off, it can be a powerful call to action because it shows up even when images don’t. Be sure to include a link in your preheader, so your reader can act on the email without opening it. Ideally, you should limit the preheader text to no more than 85 characters. Subject lines should generally be about 50 characters or less. And since many email clients are different, be sure to “front load” your subject line by putting the critical information at the beginning. That way if it gets cut off (and it might, especially on a mobile device) your main message still comes through.
Make sure it’s mobile-friendly According to Forrester, 72% of US online adults send or receive personal emails on a smartphone at least weekly. That means your email, whether it’s a sales or marketing message, needs to be optimized for reading on small screen. It also means that you need to think about the preheader and how it works together with the subject line to entice someone to open, because they often display right next to each other.
Turn down the volume Are you over-messaging your audience? It’s surprising how often companies make this mistake. You probably know first-hand how annoying it is to receive emails from the same company every day. Set up a schedule that keeps your company on the forefront of your leads’ minds without spamming them. Make sure sales and marketing are in alignment and working from the same calendar. You don’t want your sales email arriving right on the heels of the company newsletter – that is, unless you sales rep is calling out something in the newsletter that you think this prospect should really see. If you over-message your audience, you’ll likely see open rates go down while opt-outs go up. DrDDS is a digital marketing agency, connecting vendors and modern dental practice marketing with incredible online experiences. DrDDS was started by the founders of RecordLinc which is the largest network of dentists in the world. We bring in 2.5 million records on dentists from 400 different sources and work with our highly target their ideal customers using big data and machine learning. This allows you to focus on a much more concise prospecting list.