There are a number of email marketing metrics a savvy marketer can use to continuously improve the performance of his or her campaigns. I’d like to touch on the factors that impact the open rate of an email marketing campaign.

Whether your email will or will not get opened depends on the time and the day of the week when you are sending it out, how strong the relationship is with the list you have been able to build and, of course, the subject line.

Your autoresponder system should store all the emails you have ever sent out to your list along with the open rates. Note which days and times tend to be better for your list. Once you notice a pattern, start strategically targeting the times that are likely to get you the better opens.

• The relationship with your list is something that you build over time, before you need to send out a promotional email to your list. It’s a well that you need to dig way before you’re thirsty. That being said, there are still a few things you can do even in a promo piece that will continue the process of building a relationship:
• Make sure to use the “from” name they will recognize
• Brand your email messages with the name of the topic you are writing about or the abbreviated name of your newsletter  (put it in the square bracket in the beginning of the subject line.)
• Work a personal story into the copy or take a short paragraph to tell your list about what’s going on in your life right this moment. (E.g., “I’m just heading out and taking my son to the baseball game but I wanted to make sure you receive this important message”)

As they say, people do business with and refer business to those they know, like, and trust. If you want them to spend their money with you, let them know more about you, get them to like you through your stories and be consistent, and they will very soon will start trusting you.

Now, let’s talk about the subject line.

The subject line is the add for your email and hence all the copywriting principles apply here. Danny Hatch, one of the best copywriters, has identified seven “copy drivers”. They are: fear, greed, guilt, anger, exclusivity, salvation, flattery. Use these in your copy to see more action from your subscribers.

The two types of subject lines that have performed well for me are benefit-centric (“8 Free Special Reports with Resell Rights”) or curiosity-based (“Seen This?”)

You should put as much care into crafting a good subject line as you would into writing a headline for an ad. If you need inspiration to start writing, check out the 100 Greatest Headlines that Jay Abraham has put together.  Some of these could be over 100 years but they still work as well now as they did then.

Treat your Inbox as a gigantic “swipe file”. Read the emails you are getting from other marketers and see which ones you’d be interested to click on and read. Copy / paste the best headlines into a text file and store it on your computer. That will become your personal swipe file and the source of the higher email open rates.

Technorati Tags: email marketing, copywriting, internet marketing, list building, open rates

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