Give your e-mail open rates a serious boost

Too many emails get ignored

How often do you find yourself checking your email? According to a study conducted by The Radicati Group, the average office worker receives a whopping 121 emails per day! Assuming that you are working eight hours a day, Monday through Friday, that’s approximately fifteen emails an hour.

Unfortunately, between the other demands of work, there’s just no way to effectively keep up with this overload, or to give each email the same amount of attention. Today, for the sake of time and sanity, email recipients have to prioritize their emails. To do so, they often ask themselves four key questions:

1. Do I know the sender?
2. Is this message important or urgent?
3. Is this relevant to me/to my current needs?
4. Will I be able to scan this quickly?

You spend time and effort writing your client emails. How can you guarantee that they won’t be ignored? Address the questions above, and then consider these four pro-tips:

1. Start with subject lines

According to HubSpot, 33% of email recipients choose which emails to open based upon the subject line alone, and 69% of recipients report an email as “spam” after reading the subject line alone. There’s no doubt about it: subject lines are critical. When crafting yours, consider these findings from Getsidekick.com and ADESTRA.

• Being conversational? Emails with the word “you” in the subject line are actually opened about 5% less than those without.
• Everyone likes a freebie. Have an offer? Emails with the word “free” in the subject line were opened about 10% more than those without.
• Forego the forward. Emails with “fw:” in the subject line were opened 17% less than those without.
• Use company news? If your email subject line contains the word “newsletter,” you’ll likely see an 18.7% decrease in open rates.
• Have an especially important announcement? Emails with the word “alert” in their subject lines show a 61.8% increase in opens.
• Keep it short & sweet. Subject lines with 30 or fewer characters tend to have above-average open rates.

2. Consider e-mail length

Everyone is short on time these days. Communication with your prospective clients, however, is vital. Make sure that your message is clear, concise and to the point. Throughout the email, state things in as few words as possible. A study from Boomerang revealed that there is a “sweet spot” when it comes to email length, which is between 50 and 125 words. Messages within this range yielded response rates above 50%.  

3. Personalization catch attention

No one wants to be on the receiving end of a message designed for anyone and everyone – they want to read something crafted just for them. Consider adding your clients’ names to your correspondence. This goes a long way to adding a personal touch to your messages. According to ADESTRA, personalized subject lines are shown to be 22.2% more likely to be opened.

4. Always assess value

Your prospects are likely opening your email because they deem it valuable. Ensure that your message conveys your ability to provide value or solve their problem. Without value, your meticulously designed call-to-action won’t receive the response you expect. The goal is to provide enough quality information in such a succinct way that the client or prospective client wants to reach out to learn more and feels comfortable doing so.

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