Some of the easiest tests you can set up in your Internet marketing involve email. You would be shocked at the subtle differences in email marketing that affect profitability.
As I’ve written in other articles, including “Testing Words on your Website to Gain Clients,” the one thing that can generate the most changes in profitability is testing words. In our testing experience, words have been and continue to be the top reason for profitability increases or decreases.
It’s especially true when it comes to email marketing. After all, the first thing someone sees in emails is words. If those initial words don’t get the person opening the email, then nothing else matters — nothing.
To begin, there are two things you see when you get an email. The first is the sender’s name. The second is the subject line. Here is a screenshot of several emails from one of my email accounts.
A sample email inbox.Note that I have two emails from something horse-related. That tells me I’m interested because I likely signed up for them previously.
The second email is from a Mark Dulisse. I don’t know him but a while back I signed up for something he offered and that’s how I got on his mailing list. But let’s say I don’t know who he is. The next thing I’d do is look at the subject line to help me determine if I want (or need) to open it. After reading his subject line, it’s not something I’m interested in. But he did a good job on his subject line because tells you what the email is about with one quick glance.
And speaking of subject lines, a while back I wrote “Online Testing Most Overlooked Process,” an article on the importance of a headline to capture someone’s attention when reading. The subject line of an email is the headline of the piece. While people may not know who the sender of the email is, the subject line can still get them to open the email. The trick is knowing what to say. We’ll get to that shortly.
Look at the third email, from Katie Yeakle. I have never heard of the sender. So my first inclination would be that of suspicion. So I look at the subject line. It says “A $3,000 gift for you…”. Why would someone I don’t know want to send me a $3,000 gift? So immediately my response is to click delete.
Look at the next email, from iMarketing Insider. The sender is someone I recognize and is part of my profession. So immediately I’m interested. The subject line is fairly good too because it mentions a free download. “Free” is always a good thing to say. However, Google, Yahoo, Bing, and others could place your email into the spam folder with the word “Free” in it, so you should spell it differently where people will know it’s free but Google and others don’t know it’s the word “free.” An example would be: F.R.EE
Next, consider the subject line, “[Free Download] Reputation Generating Marketing….” That topic is something I do in my profession, but not extensively. So I may or may not open this email according to what I read.
That is my process of how an email gets opened. These first two items — sender and subject line — are what gets them opened or deleted so this is where you want to be most careful and spend the most time.
Let’s say a local dentist wants people to open his or her monthly emails. In that case, the sender name should be the dentist or the practice name, whichever people are most familiar with. How can you tell which will get opened the most? By testing, naturally. More on that shortly.
Before we talk about testing here, are two subject lines you can use to get people to open your emails. Even if they don’t know you, these have shown in my tests to get good open rates.
The first subject line is: “Quick question…”
The next subject line is: “[First name], have you seen this?” (First name is where your email system will insert the first name of the recipient.)
Thus, if you can’t come up with a good subject line, consider one of these two.
Now let’s talk about setting up an A/B email test. I use MailChimp for an email service provider, but there are many other good companies that offer this service. For this discussion, I’ll use the MailChimp interface, to illustrate my points.
The first rule is to test only one thing at a time. Thus, decide whether you’re going to test different sender’s names against each other or different subject lines. Never assume you’re sure that either the sender or the subject line is the best one. Unless you’ve tested it, you don’t know.
When in Mail Chimp, here’s the first screen you see for an A/B test.
First screen of a Mail Chimp A/B test.Pick which one you want to start with and test it. I prefer the “From names” first. After you decide and click Next, you can send to your entire list or a segment of your list. You can segment your list in multiple ways. If you haven’t done that, just send to your entire list. If you have several thousand on your list, just send to around 1,000 people for a test as that will give you reliable statistics. Once you decide what list to send to, click Next to set up and you’ll see this page.
Campaign Info page in MailChimp.Name your campaign with a description that easily reminds you what it’s about. Pick a subject line. You’ll use only one since you’re testing the From name and not the subject line.
On the right, you insert your two different “From names.” You can even use different emails to see if one works better but remember the rule: Test one thing at a time.
Once that’s done, click on “Tracking” below. You’ll see you can track clicks within the email too.
As you click next you’ll have different things you can set up but this is the main part. Note that you can insert a nice email template design with colors and such. In my experience, I’ve found a HTML template does not work all that well. Plain text emails have worked best for me. I think that’s because people are used to getting plain text emails from friends and it’s what they’re most likely to read. But I urge you to test that. Perhaps your test will show differently.
Once done, schedule your email to go out. The majority of your emails will get opened with 1.5 to 3 days. So check your results after 3 days as that will be the most accurate. Keep your results on a spreadsheet so you can track what’s working best. Keep using what works best. At times, challenge what’s working best to see if you can beat it. If not, then keep using the one that works best. The one that works best is called “the control” in the testing industry.
Then repeat this process for, say, subject lines, salutations, and first sentences in emails.
Over time, you will optimize for the best results and save money since you are no longer guessing.
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