How to Craft Response Generating Email Messages
I am the fortunate daughter of father who loved poetry. As a child, I loved listening to him recite poems he loved as I drifted off to my dreams. But for all the years and all the repetitions of the classics he loved, the poem my brain decided to latch onto is The Jabberwocky, by Lewis Carroll.
I could have memorized my father’s favorite poem by Ruyard Kipling, If. Though filled with beautifully crafted warnings and life lessons I preferred the gibberish story about a mythical monster being hunted by a ‘beamish boy.’ Now that I have life experiences behind me I can better appreciate the message of If.
Though email messages are seldom worthy of saving and re-reading like poetry, it’s important that we tell a short story, build a rhythm and motivate the reader to want the rest of the story.
I have taken a new look at my personal email copy reference guide and updated it to represent what I believe are imperatives in crafting email messages so they tell a story and lead the reader to a response.
1 Keep Your Content Conversational and Short
• Assume email will be skimmed and not read word for word.
• Tell the reader what to do as soon as possible.
• Use subheads in bold (or underline for text only email) to highlight important messages.
• Speak in the present and avoid wimpy words.
• Paragraphs are 3 lines or less.
• Sentences are short and punchy.
• Bullets are used for lists of benefits or other content.
• There is a lot of white space.
2 Call-to-Action (CTA) Should Appear Early
• CTA is visible when opened on a laptop in a minimized view.
• One CTA made a couple of times.
• Web-to-lead-form on the landing page collects the key contact information and forwards to a CRM, list manager, or your inbox.
• Landing page includes opt-in/out link to the landing page and privacy statement.
Language Should be Action-Oriented
• Describe the reader taking action and use active voice. (“Download the white paper and learn how you can recover laptops in minutes”).
• Good: “Recover entire laptop in minutes.” (reader oriented)
• Bad: “This industry leading application allows you to backup laptops.” (product oriented)
• Good: “IT departments worldwide save time and money by outsourcing tedious and time consuming tasks.” (active and action oriented)
• Bad: “Our product is used in more than 4,000 companies in 80 countries.” (passive voice bores the reader)
Sell the Offer, not the Product or Service
• Email is crafted to generate a response so sell the benefits of the offer.
• After the reader responds to the CTA, the real selling will be made by the sales force.
• Good: “Download the free trial software and learn how companies like yours are protecting laptop data at the click of a button.” (offer oriented)
• Bad: “Download the free trial software and discover the powerful benefits of the Enterprise Desktop Data Protection software.” (product oriented)
Focus on the Benefits First
• Choose key competitive differentiators.
• Good: “Save valuable hours on a wide range of tasks, thanks to an easy-to-use, point-and-click interface.” (benefit mentioned first)
• Bad: “Graphical, point-and-click user interface saves hours of your valuable time.” (feature mentioned first)
Be Helpful, Teach, or Tutor
• Focus on helping the reader and use second person (“you”).
• Good: “You’ll eliminate hours of tedious labor rebuilding laptops after a crash.” (focus on how the reader benefits)
• Bad: “Our enterprise data protection solution makes it easy to protect remote laptops.” (product and company oriented)
Contact Cynthia for a no obligation assessment of your social media lead generation potential. Join me on Twitter, Linked In, and subscribe to this blog.
Cynthia Nowicki, is a demand generation expert. She is at the forefront of integrating online, emarketing and social media to generate leads and nurture prospects for B2B businesses. She has spent 20 years providing Silicon Valley software startups and enterprises with integrated demand generation programs that identify prospects.
Cynthia Nowicki helps technology thought leaders, startups and B2B enterprises by implementing social media programs that expand the web footprint to attract, capture, convert and retain IT customers.
Poetry Break – The Jabberwocky – If
