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13 Tips for Effective Subject Lines

Subject lines make or break your newsletters, solo email campaigns and offers. Yet it's importance is often overlooked. Below are 13 ways to write more effective subject lines.

1. Use Your "Relevancy Checker": This isn't a widget or piece of software that can tell you exactly how relevant your subject line is. It's your common sense and your gut.

If the subject line you wrote seems to leap off the page, and even you get authentically excited when you read it back to yourself, then you could well have a winner.

Caution: Before using that subject line you're so delighted with, run it by other people. Don't skew the results by telling them how much you love it, either. That could push them in one direction or the other.

2. Watch Timeliness: The In box is a "What's happening now?" medium. Email newsletters deliver news and reviews much faster than their print counterparts. So people's expectations of what they find in their In boxes are different than what they are elsewhere.

Therefore, your subject line - be it for a newsletter or straight out offer - will understandably do better if it is addressing an immediate need of the reader. Why? Because he or she can do something about it right then and there - buy something to address the need, download a whitepaper to educate about a considered purchase, watch a video, etc.

3. Make it Newsworthy: Subject lines can have a "breaking news" feel to them. A sense of urgency or the announcement that something vital has just happened (or changed) grabs attention. Just make sure you pay it off big time in the body of that email, or else you may not get another chance down the road.

4. Be Specific: A few years ago, I decided to make most issues of my Web Digest For Marketers newsletter focus on just one piece of the Internet marketing pie.

Both readers and advertisers loved the focused approach. Readers know right away if the issue is of interest to them or not. Sad to say, not all readers read all issues. But when they read what they're interested in, they are much more engaged.

Because each subject line heralds the topic of that week's issue, many readers tell me they've created specific folders in which they keep old issues for future reference. So if they're not interested today, they may need those references weeks or months down the line.

The Long Tail of Being Focused: Because readers are saving back issues that are conveniently tagged (in the subject line) for future reference, advertisers find they're getting clickthroughs longer and longer after the initial publication of the issue in which they ran an ad. One advertiser gave me a testimonial in which he said that nine months after running an ad he was still getting registrations for a Webinar he advertised. I attribute this to the subject header of the Web Digest For Marketers newsletters, which are written to inspire people to hold onto back issues.

5. Bury the Lead? If you do bury the lead in a solo email or newsletter, you'd better know what you're doing. Do it wrong and you can come across as being too manipulative... and if the reader is time-starved (and who isn't?) you could lose him or her altogether.

But when burying the lead is done right, it can make for a good campaign. If readers are threaded through very useful or interesting facts on their way to skimming for the meat of the matter, it can be very engaging. Make it pretty easy for them to cut through and get the payoff, just the same. Give the reader full control. Also be sure you are CANSpam compliant.

PS – I myself tend to not bury the lead because the shared narrative of my audience is saying, "Give it to me quick".

6. No Humor: Unless, of course, that is your editorial tone. Direct marketers will tell you (and I agree) that it is extremely rare that humor will be engaging enough, in the right kind of way, to get people inside your email.

There will be exceptions to this rule. Just ask yourself if the time you choose to use humor is one of those exceptions. It really pains me to say this because I love a good sense of humor. But I'm afraid there isn't much room for it in a subject line. On TV, that's another matter. Those Geico and FedEx ads are a riot, and they are top of mind as a result.

7. Keep it Short: Everyone's In box is configured a little differently. But the rule of thumb nowadays says you've got about 35 characters to use in your subject line, including spaces.

Brevity is a good discipline. It forces each word to work harder, and that typically makes for a more appealing subject line.

Also keep in mind that a major trend is for people to read email on mobile devices, where things can get pretty tiny and tedious.

8. Ask a Question? We are all programmed to answer questions put to us, no matter what the medium. People just feel obliged to answer questions, or at least consider the question for a moment.

It's exactly that moment of consideration that many marketers and publishers look for. To employ this approach, you have to be very engaged with your recipients. If the question in the subject line doesn't hit the mark and resonate, your message will be deleted without a second thought.

Everyday, everyone in the online world is faced with countless yes or no decisions. Yes or no. Click or scroll. Open or delete.

The question you ask in a subject line may be one the reader is already asking him or herself, which could well cause him or her to give you a few more seconds of time by opening your email. Or he or she might scroll further down in the preview pane. (Yes, research shows that many people view entire newsletters, offers and entire emails inside that preview pane.)

On the other hand, the question you pose in a subject line may not be in their mind at all, but should be... as if to say, "Shouldn't you be thinking along these lines right about now?"

An intriguing question might well nudge the reader down a thought path he or she has not considered before. It could be a line of thinking that opens up new opportunities. Or it could alert the reader that he or she might be exposed to a risk of some sort. "Did you know the sale on iPhones runs out in 2 hours?" is a question appealing to a sense of urgency. It also alerts you to the fact that there is a sale on iPhones that you might not have known about. So the reader is getting two pieces of information for the price of one.

9. Does Your Subject Line Try Too Hard? Some subject lines are just too over the top.

Yes, they're short. Yes, they're focused. Yes, they are many things they're supposed to be. But a hard sell in a subject line leaves me cold, and in this I'm not so different than you and everyone else. Copywriters refer to this as copy that's too "muscular".

Right now there are naysayers saying, "He's wrong, he's dead wrong and doesn't know what he's talking about". Okay, there are maybe some marketing segments where really muscular copy works in a subject line – perhaps in some biz opp campaigns and certain retail environments.

But after being in this business since 1993, I notice a definite trend that online consumers of information and goods don't like the hard sell approach.

10. Hire a Good Copywriter: Email copywriters aren't paid very well. They should be, because they're worth their weight in gold if they can write good subject lines, body copy and landing pages. Unlike direct mail copywriters, no one can claim to have 20+ years of experience writing for email marketing. The field isn't nearly that old yet.

I've noticed people who know what they're doing with regard to email marketing usually also know what they're doing with pay-per-click advertising as well. The two practices are similar in many ways, especially in short lead copy and landing pages.

I've also noticed that some online copywriters aren't exclusively writing copy. They're also responsible for checking the results, running multivariate testing campaigns and paying attention to making improvements based on the results of those tests.

The good copywriters I've seen who have Internet marketers as a target audience have a close affinity to that specific target audience. In other words, they not only understand their audience - they relate to it on a personal level.

In direct mail marketing, copywriters who charge by the "package" (a good copywriter can command $5K-$30K and beyond) typically have specific areas in which they are known to be hot. One may have a reputation in financial services and publishing, while another is well known for health care. The point is each one of these industries is a study unto itself, and the copywriter needs to keep on top of the nuances and trends of that industry. I find the same is true online.

11. Truncate: The nice thing about subject lines is you don't have to write in complete sentences. Some advertisers will start a solo Web Digest For Marketers email message subject line with "Download Now:" or "Free Webinar:" and then use the remaining space to explain what the download or Webinar is about. It's a straightforward informational approach. Either you're interested in it, or you're not.

This candid approach works well with the Web Digest For Marketers subscriber base. Granted, it's a high-flown Internet marketing decision-maker audience.

12. Let's Make a Deal: Some things never change. Online or offline, B2B or B2C, people are just people. And being people, they typically like a good deal, as do I.

If you have a straightforward discount or deal to offer, well, as they say in Texas, "Bring it on". I want to hear about it. At the end of the day, most people like to be pitched to, so long as the pitch is something they are interested in.

I always look at the offers from Amazon. Maybe I open 20% of them. But I do stop to read them and consider the offer before deleting the message.

13. Consider the Source: There are subject lines I will read because they come from a trusted sender that I see in the From field. The same offer could come from someone I never heard of and I won't give it a second thought.

I've recently seen newsletters that come from support@domain.com. The irony is that I respect the person who is sending these emails. In fact, I've read two of his books. But when I see a generic From field address, my inclination is to delete it. "From field" branding is all important to the lens through which I view the subject line.

If you're a corporation, you've got a decision to make here. If you put the name of the corporation in the From field, you will probably get some brand recognition, like Amazon does. On the other hand, if you have a real person who serves as your public face, and his or her name appears in the From field, it comes across as a more personal experience for the reader. It's a tough call. What if that person leaves the firm? How will you rebrand your email efforts thereafter? These are some of the considerations you must think about before launching your email campaigns.

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