The trip was transformational.
You learned the secret to true happiness.
You can hardly wait to share it with everyone!
So you carefully craft a detailed email with all the steps.
"Surely this life-changing information will be well-received!" you think.
(People will probably write songs about you.)
You press "send" and off goes your inspired message!
You wait for the barrage of replies, questions, praise and gratitude. This is BIG!
But no one responds to your powerful email message.
Not a single soul.
Why not?
Because you didn't put anything in the email's subject line, silly!
For real, the subject line of an email (or lack thereof) often determines if a message reaches your target audience (thank you, spam filters) or if it is opened at all.
If they do open your subjectless message, you risk frustrating your reader, even more, when they try to decipher what it's all about. Consider this:
"Over 347 billion emails will be sent and received per day by 2022." 99Firms
That's a lot of email!
When it comes to fine-tuning your subject line, be kind: consider your audience and pair specificity with brevity.
Here is the least you need to know about creating a strong subject line.
1. Use one (see example above).
2. Think mobile. Between 85-95% of people check email on their mobile devices. Because different email servers display a varied amount of characters from one device to another, the recommended sweet-spot is 40 characters.
3. Make every word matter. Add a date and/or detail for specificity and organization. (E.g., "Notes from 3/11/21 sales meeting").
4. If your message is time-sensitive or requires a response, start the subject line with a key word or phrase such as "Action requested" or "Input needed." Follow that up with the related subject. For example: "Confirmation: Menu for Friday's HR training"
5. And please-oh-please purge these meaningless subject lines from your mind, fingertips, and keyboard:
- Meeting
- Update
- Checking in
- Hi
- Status