A sales email is a lot easier to ignore than a face-to-face sales pitch or even a sales call. For that reason, we need to grab our recipient’s attention from the get-go.
Don’t neglect your subject line and pre-header
Your subject line and pre-header are the most important part of your sales email (or any email for that matter). Whatever you do, don’t leave them until the last minute. You’ll need to allocate a significant amount of time to think about what’ll entice the recipient to open your email. If your subject line fails to grab their attention and your pre-header lacks intriguing details, all that time dedicated to creating your content, is time wasted!
Keep it short and casual
It’s 2019, we are used to videos, images, podcasts and so on. To be frank, we have become lazy when it comes to informing ourselves by reading! The worst crime you can commit, therefore, would be to send a long-winded email; just get to the point and keep it casual. If appropriate (not a personal one-to-one sales email), why not try to send an image-based HTML email? At this point, you’ve got your recipient to open your email with your fab subject line 😉, don’t scare them off now with a bunch of text! To find out more about adding images to your emails correctly, see our following post on ‘How to Use Images in Emails‘.
Personalization is a must
We can’t stress email personalization enough. If you know your recipient’s name, use it! In fact, why not add your recipient’s name to your subject line? This small, effortless detail can increase open rates by 16%! Also, it’ll improve your customer’s experience in general as it reminds the recipient that they have a valid connection with you and that you are not spam! See our following post on How to Improve CX with Email Personalization to find out more.
Words to avoid and spam triggers
If you take away anything from this post, I hope it’s this… “DO NOT SHOUT AT YOUR RECIPIENTS IN YOUR SUBJECT LINE.” Anything shouty (all caps) will end up in the Spam folder. Other than that, please make sure there are no grammar or spelling mistakes (with free online tools such as Grammarly, there’s really no excuse). Do not add “RE:” if it is not a reply (you’re not fooling anybody with that one 🤨) and avoid one-word subject lines (rude) and exclamations marks (again shouty) at all costs.
Alongside those “must follow” pointers, take a look here to see the 100 most common email spam trigger words you’ll want to avoid.
Words you should be using
As Warren Buffet, an American business magnate and philanthropist said:
“Price is what you pay. Value is what you get.”
Words are very powerful. They provoke variable reactions and can strengthen your sales script by miles.
Value – Choose value over price, your product has worth. Choosing to talk about the value of your product over its price will allow the potential customer to focus on what they are going to gain from using your product, the price is secondary.
Benefit – Focus on product benefits over features. How is it going to change the user’s life for the better?
Show – “Let me show you…” over “Learn more about…” automatically makes the potential customer feel taken care off. They don’t have to research and find out the value/benefits of your product themselves, you are going to “show” them!
You – It’s all about YOU, what you are YOU going to get by using our product.
And – Use ‘and‘ instead of ‘but‘… ‘but’ comes with negative connotations and prepares the receiver for the defence. They’ll know you are about to justify something about your product that could be seen as a negative.
See the two examples below by Shamus Brown, a professional sales trainer:
“I see that you only have a budget of $50,000, but let me tell you why our system costs $100,000.”
“I see that you only have a budget of $50,000, and let me tell you why our system costs $100,000.”
Do you see? Using ‘and‘ has immediately made that sentence sound more positive. It supports the negative, it doesn’t defend it.
You can read the full article here: “Sales Language: What’s wrong with BUT“.
Free – The use of the word free increases the value of a product. You are thinking, “Wuh🤔?” right now, am I right? Think of it this way… many studies have been carried out with the use of the word free. Such as, getting 30% extra free when you buy a bigger and more expensive bottle of sunscreen, as opposed to the smaller and cheaper bottle. Many opt for the bigger bottle, where they’ll receive 30% extra free.
Imagine – The word imagine is one of the most powerful words used in sales. It invites the receiver to experience the product via imagination. You are asking them to imagine, so they automatically do!
Opportunity – Turn your potential customer’s problem into an opportunity, they come hand in hand. For example…
Problem: “My emails do not arrive to my customer’s inbox.”
Opportunity (using SMTP2GO): “You now have the opportunity to focus on your content, leave delivery to us!”
Their name – The most powerful of them all, their name.
Questions and CTAs
Last but not least, you’ll want to include questions and CTAs (Call To Actions) within your email content. Give your recipient something to respond to. If not, they can ignore your email quite easily.
So, the next time you are writing a sales email, have a second tab open to this post! If you follow the pointers above, your open rates and responses are sure to increase dramatically.
