7/13/2010 7/14/2010 10:32:09 AM
Email Autoresponder Secret: What Do Your Emails Say About You?
Email Autoresponder Secret
Do you use an email autoresponder to send emails that contain offers or advertising materials to your subscribers? Or, do you use your email autoresponder to communicate with a list of followers who need to stay updated on events or classes?
Either way, if you're not sure what your emails are saying about you, you need to find out - because it's making the difference in whether people open, read, or trash the emails you send them through your email autoresponder. And if people pare trashing and not opening or reading your emails, it's costing you time and money.
There are many different ways to come across in your emails. An email autoresponder is simply a tool; an email is really an empty slate for you to write on. And that's where the danger lies; there's far too many opportunities to "mess up" when writing emails to go out through an email autoresponder.
The emails that I send through my email autoresponder make me 3-5 million dollars an year; and they may look simple, but there's a huge amount of art, science, and testing behind them. We don't send an email out that doesn't get rigorously recorded (for clicks and opens inside the email autoresponder) and compared to be sure it performs well.
Now, all this talk about "rigor and science" is a little misleading, and here's why.
Some of my top performing emails of all time are actually the most "unprofessional" and casual, fun-sounding emails you've probably ever seen come out of an email autoresponder.
Here's an example of an email that did really well for me:
___________________________________
SUBJECT: oooooooooooooooooooooooh!
[FIRSTNAME],
Check It!
==> LINK
-- Tellman
___________________________________
Now, what does that email "say" about me, if we assume you don't know anything about me to start with?
First of all, the subject line gives no indication I am trying to "sell" you something. Neither does the body. What I want to convey with this message from my email autoresponder is that I am a friend, or at least someone familiar, and that I have something interesting for you to look at. I achieve that 3 ways with the structure of the email:
. The subject line is totally unprofessional looking and is not capitalized
. The email starts off with {firstname} which allows me to use the function in my email autoresponder to make sure it will address the reader by first name.
. The email is short and gets right to the point, and doesn't try to explain anything.
In other words, my email says I am a friend.
Now, here's the problem with most of the emails that get sent out through email autoresponders for business, promotional or professional purposes: They look like business emails. And who, given the choice, really wants to open a business email sent through an email autoresponder? Given the choice between that and a friend's quick email, which would you open first? A friend's email, right?
The truth is, no one really wants to read a "professional" email about business matters, because it's boring and sounds like work.
What do your messages in your email autoresponder say about you?
Do they say "I'm a friend, and I have something cool to tell you?"
Or do they say "I'm a business, and I have an important message?"
What sounds more fun? In email autoresponders and in "real life," people are much more likely to listen - and respond - to someone that sounds fun and friendly than someone who's got work for you to do.
I made a bet, when I started writing emails 5 years ago, that the above would hold true. And it has. Remember when I said I make 3-5 million a year sending out through my email autoresponder? The emails that made me the most weren't business emails. They were FUN emails. But how exactly do I write fun emails that also sell? Click on the link below to find out.
