Remember how in the last post I said that my research found that using slang and other non-standard* ways of writing is a way to increase open rates in email marketing?
You would think that I would see this happening in marketing emails, right? Right???
Nope. It is surprisingly hard to find marketers using non-standard features in email marketing subject lines. I mean it!
I have been signed up for emails from dozens of companies for years now and there have only been a few that use some slang or informal way of writing in the subject line. Yes, marketers will use ALL CAPS in the subject lines (which I discussed in a previous post) and I’m seeing more companies use emoji in the subject lines (which I will discuss in a later post). But almost all the emails I receive – and I do mean 99.99999% of them – are written in standardized English. I barely have any in my inbox that start with a lower-case letter.
This might be the reason that non-standard writing in subject lines increases the open rate. It is used sparingly so that when it does appear, people notice! Some marketing guides have claimed that you run a risk of alienating your audience by using slang and other non-standard features. I’m not so sure this is true, but the advice seems to have been taken to heart by the industry.
I would say that using a non-standard feature here and there is a potential way to get your emails to stand out. Especially if it is somehow related to the product in the email body. In a later post, we’ll look at some examples of non-standard features in email marketing.
See ya!
* When I use the term “non-standard” to describe the language of email marketing, I’m talking about intentionally misspelled words, no capitals for the starts of sentences or proper nouns, as well as slang and slang-y ways of writing (wanna instead of want to, etc.). It doesn’t mean that any of these are incorrect, it just means that they are less formal and somehow different to the norm. (And what the norm is is the topic for a different day)
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