How to Craft a Better Email

When RSS appeared on the landscape there was much speculation that email would become obsolete.
That hasn’t happened. In fact, we’re seeing more devices becoming “must have” to keep the email umbilical cord attached. Devices that are more convenient and easier to carry around. The sub–4 pound laptops were raved but gave up the blue ribbon to the Blackberry. That’s still quite popular but the more ubiquitous cell phone is featuring email capabilities.

Simultaneously getting into someone’s inbox AND getting opened and read has become a quest for the holy grail.

An advantage of direct mail over email is that it costs money.
Confused? Let me explain…

With direct mail you have printing and mailing costs. You pay upfront for one shot at getting delivered, one shot at getting opened and one shot at getting read.
Consequently, a good bit of resources and thought are applied to the message and the design.

The monetary cost of sending email is free or relatively inexpensive. However, with little coin on the table there’s often little thought or care when crafting at the keyboard.

And that can cost you plenty. Here’s why…

With clients and business associates, the greater value is in the relationship.
Time isn’t a renewable resource and attention bidding is fierce these days.

True – there may be no immediate financial cost to clicking send. However, not honoring the value of your recipient’s time and attention can cost you a great deal… you’ll be ignored, dismissed, and possibly never welcome again. That hurts.

IF your message makes it through spam filters (about 30% of non-SPAM messages do not)…
you have 1–3 seconds to be recognized by your recipient and escape the dreaded delete on arrival index finger twitch.

Making it to the inbox doesn’t guarantee safety…
IF you don’t get read right away, you may later get flushed with a pile up of stale ‘haven’t gotten to them’ emails.

How to be Invited, Welcomed and Read

There are a number ways you can make your emails more welcome and readable by business associates and list subscribers.

Relationship. Your relationship with your reader carries the greatest impact.

When you receive an email from a friend, you open it – no debate. Why? Because you have a trusted and positive relationship with her. She’s welcome in your inbox.

Before clicking the send button consider how your message affects your relationship – does it deepen it, dull it or abuse it? The email you send today impacts how your next email will be received.

Relevancy. Is your message relevant to your reader now? Again, are you respecting your reader’s time?

From field. Notice your own behavior. As you scan your inbox, your eyes roll down the from column looking for friendlies. Make your from label recognizable to escape a fast click of the delete key. In a business relationship, you’ll often be recognized as “First Name Last Name YourEmail@YourDomain.com”. You may be mistaken for SPAM as Betty1956@gmail.com.
Keep the from address static and consistent to minimize getting snagged in SPAM filters. Folks often depend on white listing and address book entries to filter in email they want.

Subject line. Your subject serves as a headline for your email. Will it persuade the reader to open or delete? Remember, you're not the only choice in their inbox, much less their life.
Optimally it should be under 35 characters (5–7 words).
(The length has shortened recently as different devices such as Blackberries gain popularity.)

Subject ideas:

Preview pane. People often glance at their email in the preview pane and decide whether to read further or delete. That gives you 5–8 lines to either complete your message or generate enough interest in the recipient to open and read the rest.

Image blocking. Many email clients block images by default. If you’re sending HTML you may want to limit formatting to elementary stuff such as bolding.
Email clients have gotten so sophisticated and diverse that its now takes considerable design finesse to “render” non–text messages.

If you’re sending a long and/or design intensive message to one or a few people, consider sending it as an attached PDF file instead.

Keep it simple and easy to read. Reading from an email client is more difficult than from a web page. Long messages tend to overwhelm and not get read. If you need to send a long message to a list, it’s often better to send a short email driving them to a web page for the full message.

Use short words, short sentences, short paragraphs. Your reader hasn’t poured a glass of wine, sat in front of crackling fire and settled in with a good book. Keep in mind your message is one of the too many messages to be dealt with while they’re in the middle of too many things which they have too little time for.

If you’re too hard to read and understand, you won’t get read… or understood… just deleted. No matter who you’re writing to – even a Ph.D. CEO – keep it simple, keep it clear. That’s not insulting their intelligence. It’s respecting the demands on their time and attention and the less than optimal email window on the screen.

Have a personality. This relates to the relationship factor.
Think about it. If you have 50 emails in your inbox will you go for the one from your friend that always has a good story to tell, or the one from Dull Corporation written in robotic corporate speak?

You don’t need to cross the lines of professionalism. Just remember you writing to – and being read by – another human being.

This article focuses on crafting email content and does not cover other important factors which impact email marketing success such as CAN–SPAM compliance, delivery, design, tracking and list maintenance.