Subject lines for all seasons

While spammers may have the ethics of a starvation-crazed hyena, they have rather more brains.

In a seems-simple-but-why-didn't-I-think-of-that? article today, Stefan Pollard reminds us that said spammers are also using seasonal subject lines to trick their way to an open or two.

One of the basic rules of subject line writing is not to sound like a spammer. So what's an email marketer to do when it comes to holiday offers and content?

Stefan has some suggestions in his article.

If you're looking for examples of promising subject approaches, then Lisa Harmon highlights the efforts of Crate & Barrel and Chef. They use a Thanksgiving theme, but also illustrate the concept of running a series of related emails with a common thread, rather than a series of disconnected one-off messages.

And adding the third leg to our subject line stool, Bronto videoed two of their experts debating head-to-head on the good, the bad and the "best left for the cat" of various retail email subject headers.

The perfect subject line is like the search for the perfect pizza. You can get close, but however well you do, you're always left wondering if an extra pinch of oregano might have made all the difference.

More on subject lines | Tags: email marketing, subject lines, email subject lines, email copywriting

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