What’s in YOUR subject line? How to increase your open rate
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When sending a mass e-mail out to a large group, be it donors or season ticket holders, determining the correct subject line can play a large role in the open rate. How often will you open an e-mail that says, “Event on Tuesday” over an e-mail that claims, “Meet Head Coach on Tuesday!” My chances are with the latter.
In the February 24 edition of “Selling It,” an e-newsletter sent by the National Sports Forum, the Los Angeles Clippers‘ email strategy was described in detail and its application can pay dividends across the sports industry.
In an effort to grow their e-mail open rate, the Clippers devised a plan to determine the best subject line for mass blasts. Let’s say they were going to e-mail 2,000 people who had purchased tickets in the past year to advertise a special rate. They would take 10% of those 2,000 (200 people) and divide them into five different groups of 40 each. From here, the team would devise five different subject lines and send the e-mails to the subscribers.
After waiting two hours to allow subscribers to open their messages, they checked the monitoring software for each group. The subject line with the most opens and click-throughs was determined to be the most appealing and sent to the remaining 90% (1,800) of subscribers.
This approach allowed the Clippers in increase their open rate from 8% to over 12% in a short amount of time. While this approach was designed for a ticket office, it no doubt has applications for a development operation. As e-mails become a more important part of the communication process, having the correct subject line will become increasingly important to get your message across.
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Taylor Wood
