How To Write An Effective Marketing Email – Email marketing has come a long way in the past few years. But with all the brand new functionality, you know what’s funny? A well-written email with plain text can do just as much (if not better) than a highly designed email with bells and whistles. In fact, no matter how beautiful your marketing messages look, if they don’t have well-written content, your customers will stop opening your messages and start deleting them. So how do you write a great marketing email? It all comes down to some copy best practices that you should apply to both the subject line of the message and the body of the message. The next time you’re crafting a message for a big marketing campaign or just sending out a one-off email, ask yourself if your copy meets all of these guidelines first. 10 Email Copywriting Tips for Writing Better Marketing Messages We’ll start with copywriting tips for better subject lines, followed by copywriting tips for the body of your email. How to Write a Subject Line Part of writing effective email copy is nailing the subject line. The subject line is like the gateway to your email: if someone isn’t interested in opening your email, they won’t read your email copy. This attention is gathered almost entirely in the subject line of the email (the name of the sender also plays a role). We’ve written several articles about creating email subject lines, including one on the anatomy of a subject line and featuring 18 examples of great subject lines from brands. Here’s a distillation of what you need to know to write great copy. 1) Use active language. As with email subject lines, using action language doesn’t necessarily mean using verbs, although it certainly helps. For example, OpenTable sent me an email with “Take Mom to Brunch” in the subject line. Here’s one way to effectively use action language in email subject lines: By including a verb (like “get,” “download,” “save,” “ask,” “buy,” etc.), the reader knows exactly what they are. You can do it in email. But there are ways to use action language without relying on verbs, giving you more room to play with words. What it’s all about is using language that explains to the recipient what they can do with the information in the email if they choose to open it. In other words, put user value first. For example, I once received an email from TicketMaster with the subject line “Don’t miss Springsteen and the E Street Band.” They didn’t order me to buy tickets, they said, “Buy tickets for Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band tomorrow,” even though that subject line would have worked. The original subject line worked well because it was clear what I could do with the information in that email — making sure I was ready for the 10:00am on-sale time to get my tickets. (I did, thanks to that email!) 2) Personalize if possible. Highly segmented emails have higher rates — such as open rates and click-through rates — than emails that aren’t personalized. Marketers surveyed and 36% of revenue was sent via email to specific target preferences. This is not surprising at all. Finally, the more segmented your email list is, the more you can personalize your subject line and deliver relevant content to that email recipient. So ask yourself: Is there a way to make your email subject line more personal? And I’m not talking about the dynamic field where you type in someone’s [FIRSTNAME] — email recipients have long been amazed by this nifty functionality. Consider this scenario instead: You’re a realtor with a large client base… some of whom are looking to rent, while others prefer to buy. Their best locations are in many cities and zip codes. They all have different price points that they are comfortable with. Some are looking for a studio while some want a mansion. You also know that one of those groups only accepts houses that have been renovated in the last 5 years. You certainly don’t send emails to all these different parts of your list, do you? And your email subject line won’t be the same either. You might have a subject line that says, “Renovated 1BR home for rent in Cambridge: Schedule a showing,” and another that says, “RSVP: Sunday for Colonial in Sudbury.” Each subject line addresses the radically different needs of the two list segments. 3) Prioritize clarity and only then think about “interesting”. Write a topic sentence that is clear first and interesting second. In marketing copy, clarity should always, always, always be your top priority. If, after developing a clear subject line, you can make it interesting, funny, beautiful, whimsical, whatever. But never sacrifice clarity for the cost of entertainment. UrbanDaddy is an example of a company that excels at writing subject lines that are always clear and sometimes interesting, funny or entertaining. Look at the subject lines of some of the letters I received from him: UD | Hotel in the middle of the ocean Nunchuks. Made from beer cans. In the end. UD | Putting it all together: Now UD is less evil | The grill is the size of a football table This is ice cream. This is beer. This is beer ice cream. UD | Here is a private Bahamian island. Have your say Some of these subject lines will either make your recipient laugh or be quirky enough to pique your interest. But it’s always pretty clear what you’ll find when you open the email. …which brings us to our next point. 4) Match your subject line and email copy. You probably already know how important it is to match the copy of your call to action and your landing page. Well, it’s no different when crafting your subject line and email message. What your email subject line promises, the email should deliver. Why? This is not only because it is irresponsible, but also because when readers don’t actually get what was promised in the subject line, the click-through rate drops. (And in the future, so will the price of opening your email.) In 2011, we conducted our own experiment. We sent an email to two different groups of people with two different subject lines: “54 New Data Slides for Your Marketing Deck”: 26% Click-through Rate “Get Key Marketing Trends from the Marketing Data Box”: 10.4% Click-through – via Rate Through Rate The first subject line, which was more direct and precise, had a 15.4% better click-through rate than the second subject line, which was more vague and less precise. The main takeaway here? Oh, and email open rates mean nothing without clicks. How to Write an Email Now that you’ve created an email subject line, the body of your email message has your audience’s full attention. So how do you create copy that gets them to click? Here are the important ingredients you need to know! 5) Determination of compatibility. Just as an email subject line should strive to convey relevance through personalization, so should the copy in the email message. Again, your email copy needs more than a dynamic name tag to convince readers that what’s inside is relevant to them. After the start of the email, use it to explain how you know each other. Below is an example of an email sent by Warby Parker to a colleague of mine. (By the way, the subject line was very clever: “Uh-oh, the recipe is running out.”) Look at that first paragraph, in red. Warby Parker’s marketers tell readers why they’re being emailed (their deal expires soon) and the email helps them find a new pair of glasses before that expiration date. Imagine if that email didn’t have that first paragraph and instead started with that second paragraph: “Finding a new prescription can be a challenge. Fortunately, it’s easy to make an appointment with an optometrist at our Newbury Street or through our store. . is. Our friends at ZocDoc.” … Why are you emailing me about the recipe? Why should I ask you for advice? How do you know I live near Newbury Street? By reminding the recipient that they have given Warby Parker their prescription information in the past, that person is more likely to click on the offer in that email and pay for it. 6) Write in the second person. Writing in the second person means using the pronouns “you”, “you” and “you”. For example, “Bring it before you leave in the morning
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