Writing an effective email for sales outreach is tough if you are inexperienced. The competition is fiercer than ever and people receive dozens of sales emails, if not more, daily. The way buyers think and buy has evolved together with technology and so should your sales efforts. Here’s a few simple but essential tricks that will increase your email open rate and more importantly response rate.
1. Start From the Beginning – Subject Line People!
Maybe the best way for you to realize the importance of writing a straightforward subject line is to send yourself your own sales mail and open it bothon your computer and on your phone.
This way you’ll get to see what prospects see when you reach out to them whatever device they use to read emails – they see your subject line and maybe the first 10-20 words of your email. Make it worth their while!
Instead of using this space to advertise how great your product or service is, try to make an impression. For example, if you are selling email tracking software and you email starts like this:
Subject line: Great email tracking software for you
Body:
Hi John,
I hope you are well! I’m with XYZ, a company…..
The above just sounds boring and it’s so typically salesy that your open rate, let alone response rate is more likely going to be 0 (yes, zero) than not.
On the other hand, if your subject line is different and if the first few words can intrigue the lead to read the rest of your email, you’re doing the right thing:
Subject line: Question about your sales strategy
Body: John,
You can track, measure and streamline your sales outreach….
This subject line and the first few words are intriguing and lead the prospect into the benefit you are offering so they are likely to open it and read it.
There are other factors as to whether your outreach is going to be successful or not. Sometimes it’s sheer luck to reach out to the right person at exactly the right time. That is not something you can control, but the way you start your emails certainly is.
2. Body of the Email – Show Them Where Value is
The same as with the subject line, the body of your email has to be to the point. If you want replies, make it short, precise and offer a clear benefit to your potential customer.
Yes – this is to say that nobody is going to read your essays and nobody wants to know how great you and your services/products are. People are used to and don’t like the biz, marketing, sales language.
So what is the key here? Stop sounding salesy. Yes, your main goal is to sell, but you don’t want to push your potential customers away.
Make the body of your email intriguing, as personalized as possible and don’t sell your services – sell the benefit for the customer. Sell what they don’t have at the moment but will secure if you help them. In simple words – sell the value you’re going to bring to them and make it simple to understand:
Body:
Hi John,
You can track, measure and optimize your sales outreach through our email tracking software.
It lets you perform A/B tests, track opens, forwarding and click through.
That’s it. Clearly state the benefit and very briefly describe your company and/or product. If somebody is interested, you’ll get an opportunity to talk about what you are offering in more detail, so there’s no need to go into detail in your first touch with them.
3. Call to action – finish simply and precisely
The body of the email contains another very important element – the call to action. It comes last and it should be very simple to follow and again very straightforward.
So how do you write a call to action?
Ask yourself just one question: What do you expect to happen after you send your email?
If you want to schedule a meeting, you should have a precise suggestion. For example:
Are you available this Thursday for a 10 minute call so we can discuss this in more detail?
Just to show you the big picture here’s a good example of the entire email:
Subject line: Question about your sales strategy
Body: John,
You can track, measure and optimize your sales outreach through our email tracking software.
It lets you perform A/B tests, track opens, forwarding and click through.
Are you available this Thursday for a 10 minute call so we can discuss this in more detail?
Regards,
John Johnson
Business Development Manager, XYZ LLC
+1458978620
www.xyzllc.com
The example above provides your potential customer with intriguing benefit they could get if they work with you, it’s brief, precise, has a straightforward call to action and most importantly – it’s very easy for them to reply and say yes.
4. Trial and error – make the most out of email tracking tools
Now, when you have mastered the art of sales email writing, the magic doesn’t stop there.
The industry your business belongs to and the type of your product or service have their own specificities and so does your audience.
Avoiding common mistakes and following basic rules in email writing is one thing, getting to know your audience is another. In order to discover what works in your particular case and what does not, you should use some of the email tracking tools such as Yesware, Sidekick, MixMax, ToutApp etc.
Through these tools you can perform A/B testing – you send out email blasts using two or more different email threads to two equal samples of leads from you entire lead pool. All of these email tracking tools provide you with statistics which clearly determine email effectiveness and track all actions of the recipients. Here’s an example of A/B testing statistics from MixMax:
This allows you to use statistically the best approach to reach out to the remainder of your lead pool. Apart from this, email tracking allows salespeople to be more precise in deciding when and how they follow-up.
It takes a while to get a hold of all the intricacies of sales email writing and A/B testing. It’s literally trial and error, you’ll learn after a while. However, if you don’t feel confident, you want to make sure you are doing the right thing and you need someone you can rely on, check out our creative services program, or contact us for a free consultation.
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