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Netiquette examples, both good and bad, can be
very basic or more detailed and complex. It can usually be beneficial to
make note of these. The article below is a list of some bad subject
fields.
You have read a literal mountain of
articles, whitepapers, and eBooks on how to craft the perfect email subject
line. You’ve taken great strides in mastering this art, creating that one line
that captures your reader’s attention in the fraction of a second.
But
in order to fully understand how the email subject line works, you can’t just
focus on the best. You also have to explore the worst.
Email
subject lines are a delicate touch point. You can create a brand advocate with
a great one, but you can also lose a subscriber, get marked as spam, and lose
all credibility with your audience with a poor one. Oftentimes, there’s a fine
line between what is considered “good” and what is just outright “bad”. Where
is the line? How do you avoid crossing it?
Well,
we’ve already covered Amazingly Effective Email
Subject Lines, so let’s check the other side of the coin and draw
the line between what works and what tends to backfire. Here are eight ugly,
horrible, no good, terrible subject lines:
1.
“Chris, you won’t believe what we have in store for you!!!”
Let’s
start out with one that we can easily identify as junk. This combination of
vague wording and an obviously lazy personalization combine to create a subject
line that will immediately get deleted when it shows up in my inbox. “Clickbait” subject lines are just a cheap
parlor trick. They may work the first time they’re seen, but consistent use
will leave your audience initially bored, and eventually angry. And think about
context: your recipients are probably getting hundreds of email a day.
Clickbait fatigue probably sets in at about email number 10.
2.
“See What’s New this November”
(See
also, “Happy New Year’s!”)
Most
companies getting their feet wet in email marketing will start out with the bar
set at “monthly newsletter”. Unfortunately, this leads quickly to a rut filled
with repetitive and inherently boring information.
Filler
words, generic copy, and underwhelming content are the quickest way to kill
your open rates. Yes, sometimes you and your staff will do something
interesting. But when your readers see the same subject line (or even something
remotely similar) each month, they will assume the content within is also the
same.
3.
“We Know You’ll Love This”
image:
http://cdn.business2community.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/shutterstock_164636486-Converted3.jpg.jpg
This
line is so close to being decent that it physically hurts me
to write it. For marketers with a solid database and automated tracking,
identifying the individual needs of your demographic and segmenting them
appropriately is an insanely effective course of action. There are two reasons
why this subject line sucks:
4.
“We Did a Study and Now We Want You to Read the Whole Thing Right Now So That
We Can Get Feedback and Sell You Something”
I
like to call this sort of subject line the “Terms and Conditions,” because it’s
long, boring, takes forever to get to the point, and I end up just moving on
with my life before finishing it.
The
absurd length guarantees it will be cut off by most email platforms (no way I’m
getting that monster to fit on my iPhone) and the initial wording doesn’t have
enough detail to really draw me in. You have to front load your subject line
(important keywords first), and keep it short! Brevity is the soul of wit, and
the heart of email marketing.
The
only exception to this rule is the weekly digest I get from Invision, which I
can never seem to resist opening regardless of the fact that I can’t see the
full subject line. This length issue can be overcome with top-shelf content,
and only after you’ve proven value to your readers with shorter introduction
emails.
5.
“You Have to Act Now”
Oh,
I do?
I really have
to act right now, dropping everything to buy your eBook, or score tickets to an
event that is still 97% unsold?
This
is another one of those “right place, right time” sort of subject lines, and
should be used with caution. If you’re honestly communicating something so
urgent that it warrants a borderline rude opening statement, then by all means
dive right in. But for most of us, this subject line will cause a bit of bad
blood and a “boy who cried wolf” relationship dynamic moving forward.
6.
“THIS EBOOK WILL CHANGE YOUR BUSINESS FOREVER!!!”
Please
stop yelling, you’re going to scream your way right into the trash.
Caps can be
used sparingly, but never in a manner that could be conveyed as someone yelling
at the reader. Typically, the caps lock button should be reserved for angry
YouTube comments and sweet emails from your grandma on your birthday.
7.
“Our Service is So Great, Let Me Tell You About It”
image:
http://cdn.business2community.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/shutterstock_278340521-Converted-300x200.jpg-300x200.jpg
Are you only ever talking about yourself in your email
subject lines? That’s too bad, since you’re creating a massive rift between you
and your readers. A constant focus on “ME, ME, MEEE” doesn’t help connect your
product or service to your potential or existing customers. It’s the equivalent
of the friend in the group who always has to top every story with their own
“much better” tale in turn:
“Oh,
you went to Hawaii for 10 days on your honeymoon? Well, I went to Fiji on mine
for three whole weeks, and the locals named a sandwich after me. So…”
Please,
don’t be this person. (Focus on the benefit of your
product or service, and what problems it solves for your readers, rather than
how inherently great it is.)
8.
“Marketers are raving about a new tool that…”
This
is a trick that I like to call “using the force,” since it places an incomplete
sentence in the subject line, in an effort to force the reader
to open it just to find out if it is worth reading.
Not
only will this dance dangerously close to the outright clickbait category, you
will likely lose a fair number of subscribers if the content of your email
isn’t a perfect match. No one likes to be tricked into anything, and a single
open is never worth losing a subscriber for.
Conclusions
So
what did we learn? Let’s move away from the cesspool that I just placed before
us, and look to a few positive takeaways:
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTgYHHKs0Zw&__scoop_post=bcaa0440-2548-11e5-c1bd-90b11c3d2b20&__scoop_topic=2455618
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In addition to this blog, Netiquette IQ has a website with great assets which are being added to on a regular basis. I have authored the premiere book on Netiquette, “Netiquette IQ - A Comprehensive Guide to Improve, Enhance and Add Power to Your Email". My new book, “You’re Hired! Super Charge Your Email Skills in 60 Minutes. . . And Get That Job!” will be published soon follow by a trilogy of books on Netiquette for young people. You can view my profile, reviews of the book and content excerpts at:
www.amazon.com/author/paulbabicki
If you would like to listen to experts in all aspects of Netiquette and communication, try my radio show on BlogtalkRadio Additionally, I provide content for an online newsletter via paper.li. I have also established Netiquette discussion groups with Linkedin and Yahoo. I am also a member of the International Business Etiquette and Protocol Group and Minding Manners among others. Further, I regularly consult for the Gerson Lehrman Group, a worldwide network of subject matter experts and have been a contributor to numerous blogs and publications.
Lastly, I
am the founder and president of Tabula
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