How to Boost Your Email Open Rate [Infographic]

If there’s one thing that we’re not short of in this digital age, it’s marketing tactics. You can reach out via PPC advertising, mobile, social media, email, and so on. There are a lot of choices, and every day, a new expert pops up with the latest fad.Trying to keep up can be exhausting, and it’s completely unnecessary if you back your efforts on the most tried and true solutions. Email marketing may not be the sexiest option, but it’s one of the most reliable.Did you know, for example, that 73% of millennials would rather conduct business communications by email? Or that using emails over Facebook or Twitter increases your chances of gaining new business forty times over? We could create an entire post listing the statistics alone. But the team at 99 Firms did that perfectly when they created the infographic below, so we’ll focus on how to entice your recipients to open your emails.

73% of millennials would rather conduct business communications by email

Let’s learn about the three main factors that help people decide if your email is worth the effort or not.

Focus on the Subject Line First

How many emails do you receive a day? Ten, fifty, hundreds? The reason that you receive so many is because email marketing is highly effective. Now, how many of those emails do you actually open and read? What makes you decide which emails to read and which to ignore?Usually, it boils down to one simple factor—the subject line. If that fails to ignite your interest, then you’ll probably move on. The same is true for 47% of email recipients. Your subject line might be the only shot you have of getting your email opened, so make it count.You want people to be intrigued. As an example, during Obama’s presidential campaign, the subject line that got the most responses was, “Hey.”Keep it to the point and make it stand out from the hundred other emails your recipient receives. What about adding the recipient’s name? Or an emoji? Both of these help get recipients’ attention.

Your Preheader Text Comes Next

The preheader text shows up under the subject line and is designed to give the recipient a sense of what the email contains without them having to open it. Think of the subject line as the bait that gets them interested, and the preheader text as the hook that helps hold their attention.Make it different than the subject line. Keep it short and give an idea of what the key point of the email is. Finally, include a call to action here to prompt them to read the email itself.

The Sender Name

The internet is a scary place. Opening the wrong email could mean infecting your computer with malware. We’re constantly warned that we shouldn’t open emails from unknown sources. How do we determine the source? We check the sender’s name.It’s the deciding factor for 42% of people globally. If the email address looks suspect, most people prefer to not take a chance on it. This means, if you want people to open your email, you need to make sure that your company name is clearly listed.Take things a step further by using a dedicated email address for a particular person at the company. Think something along the lines of Sandy@ABCCompany.com instead of Admin@ABCCompany.com. It doesn’t sound like it would make much of a difference, but people are more likely to trust an email address that looks like it comes from a real person.This is also why it’s not the best idea to use a “No reply” email address. After all, if you’re asking someone to read an email you’re sending them, it’s only polite to allow them the opportunity to respond.

Final Notes

That wraps up the top three tips to help coax your recipients to open your emails. Do you want to find out how to optimize the content as well? Then check out this infographic.