Don’t pin your hopes for sales success on assumptions about what time people read their emails or which emails they’ll read. Take a look at the data – it doesn’t lie.
Keep your subject lines relevant
The subject line is square one for improving your open rates. The only way a prospect that has never spoken with you or maybe never even heard of your company will open an email is if the subject line first catches their eye and then intrigues them enough that they will take time to learn more.
At the same time, you don’t want to raise your open rates at the expense of your response rates, or your email reputation for that matter. Some people will resort to trickery in order to increase their open rates with strategies like making the email look like it comes from someone the prospect knows by keeping it extremely casual – something like “Take a look at this” or “Want to go?”. These subject lines are deceptive and the prospect, having opened your email, will likely be extremely put off when they discover they’ve been hoodwinked. Keep your subject lines professional and as close to a brief summary of the contents of the email as you can.
Shorter is Better
It can be a challenge to squeeze all of the content that you’re eager to share with your prospects into a few sentences, but once you manage to do so, your response rates will soar. In a recent study click-through rates on an email with three sentences were three times higher on average than for an email with seven sentences.
The fact that 53% of all emails are now opened on a mobile device is also notable. Personally, if I receive an email that’s several paragraphs long on my cell phone, I’m not going to bother reading it, let alone responding. Even if you do keep someone’s attention through a lengthy email, you’ll likely lose them if you’re asking them to take action at the end.
Don’t Be Afraid to Name-Drop
Email engagement rates skyrocket when local references are used. If you email a plumbing company and reference their top competitor across town and mention the benefits you’ve been able to provide for them, there’s a strong chance your email will be opened and read, and your content downloaded.
Keep these simple tips in mind and watch your metrics soar! We use these principles in our business every day. Drop us a line to see how we can do take care of this for your organization, so you can sit back and watch the leads roll in!