7 tips for creating amazing email subject lines

Crafting the right email subject line is practically an art in and of itself.

As a chiropractor, you devote a lot of time to trying to communicate with your audience-the community, your patients, your mailing list, or others in your sphere of influence. Having the right email subject lines is an essential part of getting your messages read. As such, it does take some thought and care to really get it right.

In this article, we’ll review some email subject line best practices that can help you get your messages opened and read, rather than sent to the spam folder or deleted.

1. Personalize your subject lines

Subject lines aren’t one-size-fits-all. You do need to think about the reader and what’s likely to capture their attention and motivate them to read your message. Is this email for your patients? Are you sending this to a mailing list or just one person? What point are you trying to get across?

2. Avoid gimmicks

Using a really gimmicky subject line will probably get your readers to hit the “spam” button. Even if they know it’s from you and are expecting your email, avoid the temptation to use a hard-sell subject line. Your own patients may even delete a message starting with “Get This Deal Now,” plus, it’s hardly a good way for any professional to start an email.

3. Describe the email’s topic

Choose a subject line that actually informs the recipient of what to expect. Luring your readers to click and read your message may be important, but a subject line that really isn’t reflective of the message’s contents isn’t very helpful at all. And you definitely don’t want to bait and switch with your messages.

4. Know spam triggers and avoid them

Some words are more closely associated with spam emails, so filters are designed to keep out these messages. Beware of spam trigger words like “free,” “special offer,” “deal,” and even “help” or “percent off.” This can make advertising tricky, but you’ll need to just be creative. Having a sale on nutritional products at your office? You might want to think about how you word the email subject line so your message actually arrives in inboxes and is also read.

5. Know your message, THEN create a subject line

After getting your email together, think about these best practices in this article. Create one or two subject lines and show them to colleagues, team members or even a patient or two and get their opinions. The subject line is one of the most important parts of your email and you certainly don’t want to leave it to chance. Get feedback first.

6. Test subject lines

If possible, use a few different subject lines with the same message and test them out for open rate and positive response from readers. This is especially important if you’re sending out emails to a list of people or doing advertising. You want to conduct your own experiments and see what actually works and doesn’t work with writing these subject lines.

Once you have some data, you can begin comparing messages and subject lines and see what you could do differently next time. Even if the message inside is exactly the same, you may end up with very different responses.

7. Learn and revise your subject lines

Identify patterns and learn how to write better subject lines over time. Until you actually see what works for your audience, it’s tough to know what’s best and how you should approach the task of writing emails and preparing subject lines.

Try to see this process as an ongoing experiment. In time, what you’ve learned about subject lines and creating better emails may help you improve your own communication with patients and your outreach to the community. It’s important that you pay attention to details and look for smart changes you can readily make to improve your work.

Sources

1. Gandolf, S. “7 Tips to Writing the Perfect Healthcare Email Subject Line.” Healthcare Success blog. https://www.healthcaresuccess.com/blog/healthcare-marketing/7-tips-to-writing-the-perfect-healthcare-email-subject-line.html. Accessed: April 2018.
2. Couch Medcomms. “Healthcare Email Marketing: How to Choose Subject Lines That Work.” http://www.wearecouch.com/blog/healthcare-email-marketing. Published: October 2016. Accessed: April 2018.