The Key to Subject Lines

keyIn design and marketing, it’s all about image and getting your message across. So brainstorming and offering advice to my clients just comes with the territory when you design logos, websites and various other printed marketing materials. But what about email marketing campaigns? Because I help set up and manage eZines, broadcast messages, and drip campaigns, the subject line always seems to be a hot topic…and the hardest to come up with at times seemingly.

So what’s my advice on subject lines for email campaigns? Simple…the subject line of your email should describe the content of your email. Sound stupidly simple?

Besides those who use their subscribers to only sell, sell, sell, I believe the masses would totally agree with me. Nothing is more annoying than a confusing or misleading subject line. You’ll simply aggravate your subscribers and in turn lose them all together. Case in point: I received one this week titled ” did you blow up my server??” (written exactly like that). Needless to say I unsubscribed immediately because all their subject lines were seriously that stupid.

If you’re sending a newsletter, then put the name of the newsletter and date or issue number in the subject line. If you’re sending a special or promotion, let them know what’s inside via the subject line. If your subject line sound salesy, chances are they won’t open it anyway which really defeats the purpose, right?

The bottom line is when it comes to email marketing, the best subject lines are direct, to the point, and tells what’s inside. Your subscribers will appreciate it and won’t be so hasty to drop out all together.

Did You Know?

Did you know that you can create a backup of all your active lists in Aweber?

aweber-logo1If you didn’t, it’s super easy and takes just a few minutes.

  1. Login to Aweber
  2. Click on the “Home” link
  3. Click on the “Create and Manage Lists” link next to the “Current List” drop-down box.
  4. Click the “Back Up & Export All Active Lists” link. You will get a pop-up window at this point. Select the email address to send the backup notification to and click “Export All.”

For now, that’s it. Once Aweber has created your backup file, you will receive an email message…the one you chose above…letting you know it is available for download.

At that point, follow all of the steps above, only when you get the pop up window this time, there will be a “Link to Download.” Click that link to download and backup all your active lists. This link is available for 2 weeks from the date it was created.

So how often should you backup your lists? I think it depends on the amount of lists you have, the number of subscribers, and how active your account is. I’m sure Aweber has backup methods in place, but nothing is infallible. Of course it also depends on what you’re comfortable with. Me being the queen of backup, backup, backup, I do this monthly on Aweber. However, if I had a ton more subscribers (hint, hint), I may begin doing a backup more frequently.

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Google Feeds Gone Wild?

I’ve probably mentioned several times how much I love Aweber. Nothing has changed, but this last week I was shocked to see my blog broadcast, that is released to my subscribers every Tuesday through Aweber, was…well a little off. One of my good friends, and subscribers, forwarded the broadcast to me asking, “What the heck?”

Well it didn’t take me long to see exactly what she was referring to. Seems instead of sending only the last week’s new posts, it included a slew of older posts from December…ten of them to be exact. I’m sure my other subscribers were just as confused and wondered why on earth I would send these old posts from last year.

Racking my brain, I couldn’t figure out why this would happen all of a sudden. I hadn’t changed any of those blog posts, I hadn’t changed my blog broadcast in Aweber, so what happened?

I immediately put in a support ticket to Aweber to see if they could help figure this problem it out. After investigating my problem, their reply alluded that it looked as though my RSS feed had changed. Well it only took me a few seconds to realize they may actually be right. Just the week before I had logged into my FeedBurner account, only to be met with the following message:

feedburner

Now, this was a little weird. First of all I have never received any communication via email or otherwise that Google had acquired FeedBurner. Second, there was absolutely no information on this page, just an ultimatum basically, to move my feeds to a Google account.

This is not exactly the right way to go about doing things, Google. I mean I’m a pretty big fan of Google, and use many of their applications, but the least they could have done is give someone a head’s up on what is going on and about to happen, especially on something that is this sensitive to my business and can potentially affect my subscribers.

So I go through the seemingly quick process of moving my feeds – I mean I have no choice in the matter after all. There is no work around here, no way to view my feed information, no way to access my actual FeedBurner account, until I go through the process of moving them to my Google account…and all seems well.

Until of course my blog broadcast goes out the following Tuesday with ten old blog posts from December, most of which were a series from my 12 Days of Christmas Giveaway promotion. How could Google be so careless to allow this to happen? I mean Google isn’t exactly a Mickey Mouse setup…they are Google for heaven’s sake.

So to my subscribers, I do apologize for the hiccup of last Tuesday and hope that you didn’t miss the actual new posts that included Freebie Friday – Douglas Vitkauskas Fonts and Creative Spotlight: Wee Walk for Clyde’s Hope. As for Google, well, I hope they have fixed the problem for others by now instead of letting everyone fend for themselves in a situation that we had no say so over.

Aweber Meets Twitter

Don’t you just love it when one of your favorite services gets even better or just simply makes your life even easier? I sure do and that is exactly why I continue to love and use Aweber as my preferred email marketing and campaign service. For instance, when Aweber added blog broadcasting to its offering, I thought it was the best thing since sliced bread. I immediately took advantage of this feature and love the sheer beauty of automatically sending my blog posts to subscribers. I don’t have to remember to do a thing!

So what has Aweber added to sweeten the pot today? How about the ability to Twitter your email newsletters.

So how does it work? When you send a new broadcast to your subscribers, Aweber will automatically update your Twitter status with the subject line of your email and a short link to an online version of your newsletter. Easy-peasy!

Just think of the possibilities!

Aweber + Twitter = Expanded reach to potential new subscribers

Now that is a pretty sweet feature and kuddos to Aweber for making their service not only better, but making our lives so much easier in the process. The best part though, of course, is being able to reach a whole new audience and potentially gain subscribers along the way. This is email marketing meets social networking without the fuss or extra effort!

If you’re still using one of those other email marketing campaign services, you should take another look at Aweber. If you’re already an Aweber user, then get Twittering in a whole new way!

Connie’s email marketing tip: Don’t forget to include information in your email campaigns on how to subscribe to your newsletter or email list. Sure you’re sending it to people who have already subscribed, but what if they forward your newsletter on to a friend or colleague who might be interested in subscribing as well? This especially comes into play if you plan to use this new Twitter feature with Aweber. If people are seeing your newsletter that aren’t subscribers, then be sure to make it easy for them to subscribe and watch your list grow!

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