How much thought do you put into the subject lines of your emails?
It’s amazing how a tiny piece of text can make such a huge difference in the results that you get. The subject line of your email could be the single biggest reason why someone decides to either open your email or delete it, so it’s incredibly important that you get it right!
In a time when attention spans are small and people’s time is limited, you need to ensure that what you send stands out and grabs that small amount of attention on offer.
Nathan Littleton, an email marketing expert with over 20 years of experience, recently held a guest webinar for our Critical Conversations series. This blog features just some of the highlights.
Why Are Subject Lines So Important?
64% of people have said that the reason they open an email is because of the subject line, and the good news is that the secret to writing the best subject line is really easy.
All you need to do is make sure that they are interesting and intriguing.Â
It’s no secret that people’s attention spans are getting shorter, and in a world where you face a daily bombardment of information, it’s going to take something special to stand out. Your audience is likely making a split-second decision about whether to open and read your email or send it straight to the trash.
The intrigue to aim for should be just enough to get them to open and read the first line of your email. But this doesn’t give you license to write any old clickbait; your text should be relevant and, above all, genuine.Â
Are you unsure about how to create intrigue? The key is to give just enough to encourage them to read the first line and to do this means that you shouldn’t give too much away.
11 Examples Of The Perfect Email Subject Lines
With over 20 years of experience, Nathan Littleton is still learning, and one way that he comes up with new subject titles is by learning through others and making sure that his choices are in keeping with his brand identity.
This blog will cover 11 different kinds of email subject lines. You won’t necessarily use all of them, and you should only pick the ones that will work well for you.Â
To make the right decision, ask yourself:
What are you looking to achieve?
What is the message that you want to get across?
What voice do you want to portray?
These are examples of subject lines that you could start using straight away. Some will work very well for your objective, while others won’t. This exercise is to give you ideas on how to diversify your emails, make them stand out, and potentially generate more action.
1
Benefits Subject Line
The first is the benefit subject line, which is designed to explain the very benefit of the content of the email that you’re sending, such as linking through to a blog post, a new video, or maybe a podcast that you have published recently.
The great thing here is you are giving them a key indication of what value they’re going to get from the email that you’re sending. But the key to this type of email is understanding your audience. Specifically, you have to understand what their challenges or opportunities could be – you need to know whether the benefits that you’re giving within your subject line are going to speak to the person receiving it.
You could say that you’re giving them a gift, or a special invitation. Either works well for product launches, early access to an event, or the launch of a new program.
2
How To’s
The how-to is designed to explain exactly how someone can achieve a specific aim.Â
You have to understand what their challenges or opportunities are to make sure that it resonates with them. But this is another great way to link through to blog posts, videos, and social media posts, presuming that the content on offer is going to enhance their life or business.
Presuming you are an expert in what you do, you should ensure that your subject lines fit with your area of expertise.
3
 Avoiding Negative Outcomes
Avoiding negative outcomes is all about pushing people away from fear, especially the fear that something bad can happen. The implication is that by clicking on your email, you will be able to keep negativity from them.
It’s always easier to persuade people away from a negative situation than it is to attract them towards a positive one, and this is why these subject lines work so well.
Examples include, ‘Don’t Make The Same Mistake I Did…’ Or ‘I Think There’s A Problem.’ As well as feeding into the natural urge to avoid a bad outcome, it piques curiosity and will encourage your recipient to read the email.
4
Scarcity and Urgency
This is particularly good if you run product launches. For Nathan, whenever he launches an online course, a new book, or a new program, he likes to use these particular subject lines to increase the urgency of a deadline.Â
Now, it could be that you have a certain number of places available on a course, there are only a limited number of products available, or it could be an offer of early bird pricing for a product you’re launching. Either way, what you’re looking to do here is make people take action now.
Some examples of this are ‘Last Chance’ or ‘Don’t Miss This’ as both of these require an action to be taken to avoid the dreaded FOMO.
5
 Commands
These are really simple, and they should be the easiest subject lines for you to create.Â
Have a look at your existing marketing processes. Have you got some marketing automation that you could tweak the subject lines on? Or maybe you’ve got a sales process where you already have pre-written emails where you’re encouraging people to take the next step.
One example of this subject line is ‘Next Step’; perhaps you are guiding people through a sales or marketing process, or it could be that you are guiding them through an onboarding process.
6
Teasers
Teasers are the essence of interesting and intriguing. Your line should tease people into reading your contentÂ
These are fun to use, and they can be as simple as ‘I Saw This And I Thought Of You’ or ‘Sneak Preview.’
‘I Saw This And I Thought Of You’ is perfect if you’re looking to reconnect with your audience, and who doesn’t love getting an exclusive look at something before everyone else?Â
Both should make your reader feel special.Â
7
Mimicking
Now, this is a bit of an interesting one. The idea of a mimicking subject line is to catch people off guard.
But it’s worth noting that we’re definitely not looking to trick people. You should not be sending spam emails, and neither should you be sending emails pretending to be someone else.
For example, you can imitate the format of a subject line that someone might regularly receive from elsewhere, such as ‘Joe Smith shared workshop.mp4.’ This is very similar to the format that you might receive from a Google or Dropbox platform.Â
You should only use this method in rare circumstances and only every now and then, but they can prove very effective.
8
 Lists
The list technique does give the game away, so reduces the amount of intrigue you can create, but if your email is targeted to exactly the right audience and you understand their challenges, then lists are some of the most compelling content that you can put out there.
Try and use these when you next promote existing content or perhaps send an email newsletter that includes the topic of a particular list. For example, ‘Six Ways To Sell Your Home Faster’ or ‘Eight Reasons That You’re Losing Sales.’
Even though they might give a lot away, if they speak to legitimate challenges, the list can be very effective.
9
Mismatches
The mismatch gives you a chance to have a lot of fun, and you can be quite silly with them. If you’re trying to ensure subject lines are interesting and intriguing, then mismatches are perfect!
Let’s take a look at a couple of examples. What could Jennifer Aniston teach you about car leasing? This is a massive mismatch, but if you’re in the car leasing business, you could create a story that tells you something about when you saw Jennifer Aniston in a film or a TV program. Perhaps there was something that she said that reminded you of car leasing or the way the business works.Â
You could do this with anything that you’ve seen in the public eye. Just make sure that you use a recognizable celebrity name to build your story off the back of it.
10
Questions
Questions are so easy to create, but the trick to a successful email subject line is to consider what intrigue the question creates.
You could try ‘Could You Do Me A Favor?’ If you use this as the subject line, it means that someone will, at the very least, find out what you’re asking them to do before they decide whether they’re going to say yes or no.Â
Make sure that you are reasonable with your requests and the favors that you’re asking, but generally speaking, people have a tendency to want to help.Â
11
 Targeted Subject Lines
What can you do within your subject line to make your readers feel like it’s just for them?
It could be as easy as just including their name.
Names can be included within your mass emails, and using an email marketing platform that can merge tags is the easiest way to achieve this. Or, if it’s just a one-off, you could include their name to make them feel like it is just for them.
A strong email marketing campaign aims to make your audience feel like what you’re offering is just for them.Â
Knowing your own target audience, what approach could you take that speaks directly to them?
One example could be to say, ‘Just For New York Lawyers’ or ‘Hey, Are You An Accountant?’ If you work with couples getting married, you could try ‘What Does Every Bride And Groom Want?’
This blog will cover 11 different kinds of email subject lines. You won’t necessarily use all of them, and you should only pick the ones that will work well for you.
Next Steps
The idea of the 11 email subject line categories is to give ideas of what you could try.Â
Nathan recommends creating a note to yourself and calling it the Swipe File. Maybe you’ve got an email in your mind at the moment that you know you need to reply to, or maybe you’ve got an email that you’ve been just putting off crafting, and you could do with a subject line to maximize the results that you get.Â
Your Swipe File can include any of the subject lines that you’ve read about today, and you should also make note of any that have captured your attention recently in your inbox. Make your Swipe File a living document that you can refer to whenever you need inspiration for an email marketing campaign.
Don’t forget to note the ones that worked well in certain situations and note the times that they didn’t work, ask yourself, how could they be more effective next time?Â
