How to Write an Email That Converts—From the Subject Line to the CTA

Email marketing is a crucial part of running any business today. For an effective email marketing campaign, you need to be able to write an email that achieves a good conversion rate. However, this process doesn’t have to be intimidating. We’ve gathered the most important tips to help you craft that perfect email.

Choose an Attention-Grabbing Subject Line

Start your emails off on the right foot with a great subject line. You need the subject line to grab recipients’ attention, as the subject determines whether people even read the email. Even the best-written email won’t convert if no one reads it.

To create an engaging subject line, you should make sure that the subject line:

Implies a benefit to reading the email
Offers a deal or a discount
Is timely
Is personalized

Take Advantage of Preview Text

In addition to the subject line, the other preview text is a crucial factor that determines whether a recipient opens your email. This is the little bit of text that is displayed in the recipient’s inbox and gives a hint of the email’s content. Depending on the device and email client, the preview text will be 35 to 140 characters.

You can take one of two approaches with the preview text. Use it to supplement your subject line. Or use it to highlight something else in the content to further encourage people to open the email.

Make Sure the Subject and Preview Text Are Relevant to the Body

While you want your email’s subject line and preview text to draw attention, you don’t want to do so in a way that misleads. So, always ensure that the text in these areas is relevant to the rest of your email.

The body of the email should flow smoothly from the subject and preview text. Otherwise, recipients will just close your email. Even worse, having a misleading or irrelevant subject line can hurt your reputation and cause people to unsubscribe.

Use Short Paragraphs

When it comes to formatting the content within your email, follow the same best practices you would for a blog post or your website. Keep your sentences short and sweet, and stick to paragraphs that are just a few lines long. Break up the text with paragraph breaks and bullet points. The goal is to make the email easy to read or even skim.

Keep It Conversational

The overall tone of your marketing emails should be conversational. You want the recipient to feel as if you are a friend talking to them, so use second-person pronouns. This will help you build relationships with your clients, boosting engagement and pushing them along the sales funnel.

Don’t Overuse All Caps and Exclamation Marks

Part of keeping the tone in your email conversational is avoiding “shouting.” All caps seem like shouting online, so while you can occasionally put a single word or two in all caps for emphasis, don’t overuse it. The same is true of going overboard with exclamation points.

Choose Words to Stir Emotions

As you write marketing email copy, consider the language you want to use. Overall, you should try to stir the readers’ emotions. Including sensory words helps readers build an emotional connection with what you’re saying. Analogies can also be incredibly useful when it comes to evoking emotions.

Use Psychology to Your Advantage

With any type of marketing, including email marketing, you want to take advantage of psychology to encourage conversions and action.

Fear of Missing Out

One of the most useful elements of psychology to include is the fear of missing out. This is why many marketing emails include scarcity or urgency and limited-time offers are so effective.

Social Proof

Social proof is a phenomenon where people copy others’ actions when unsure of how to behave in a situation. One way to use social proof in your emails is to highlight customer testimonials or awards your business has received. You can also include press mentions or even customer usage statistics.

This information gives email recipients more reasons to trust your brand. As a result, your emails get a much higher chance of conversion.

Include Photos of People

When choosing images for your email, include at least some with faces in them. These will elicit more of an emotional response and connect to the recipient.

Segment and Personalize

Segmentation and personalization go together, as you need to segment your contact list so you can better personalize the emails. This will ensure that you only send emails to people who will find them useful. You won’t overload your subscribers with irrelevant emails, as that could lead to them unsubscribing.

Consider using email marketing software that lets you automatically insert the recipient’s name or recent purchase into the email. At the very least, segment your audience based on categories such as where they are in the sales funnel, recent purchases, and demographics.

Include a CTA

Every single email you send should have a goal, and you will use a call to action or CTA to work toward that goal. Not including a CTA is a missed opportunity.

The tricky part is choosing a call to action that makes sense for your email. You don’t want to push for a sale in every single email. Yes, some emails will have a CTA encouraging a purchase with a coupon code. But others should encourage something like reading a relevant article on your website or sharing feedback.

Do A/B Testing

A/B testing is a great tool for perfecting your email marketing copy. Use it to see what subject line or CTA performs best. You can also use A/B testing to compare formatting, images, and copy used in your email. You should also look at other analytics, such as clickthrough rate, open rate, and bounce rate.

The Bottom Line

Writing an email that converts starts with an attention-grabbing subject line and interesting preview text. From there, keep the tone conversational and format the content so that it is readable. Include a clear CTA at the end that aligns with your overall goals.

Lastly, don’t forget to review metrics for your email marketing and consider A/B testing to fully optimize your email.