03Section 3 of 8
SUBJECT LINES - The subject doesn't need to be clever.
“Waiting on commissions data” booked nine meetings for Everstage. Someone who deals with commissions can read that and know what the email is going to be about.
I don't think there's much to improve by making it sound more interesting. I'd rather keep it recognizable and get into the problem in the first line.
The length results from the broader analysis were pretty clear:
12.2 MILLION-EMAIL ANALYSIS
Short subjects booked more meetings per send.
Meetings booked per 100,000 emails
3 words or fewer
15.1
4–6 words
12.1
7–10 words
13.6
Long subjects
10.6
The original post gives these rates without the send count for each length group. It does not define how many words were in the “long” group.
Per 100,000 emails, the groups booked 15.1 meetings with three words or fewer, 12.1 with four to six, 13.6 with seven to ten, and 10.6 with long subjects. The original post does not define the long group's word count.
View original chartSubjects with three words or fewer booked about 42% more meetings per send than the long group. But seven to ten words also beat four to six, so I wouldn't turn this into a rule about deleting every possible word.
I'd test “commissions” against “waiting on commissions data.” The second takes longer to read, but it gives the person more context. The meeting data can tell us whether those extra words were useful.
Then I'd look at the first sentence beside it. That's what appears in the inbox preview. If it starts with an introduction about me, I've used the bit they can see before opening without explaining why they should open it.
For the hypothetical software and agency, these are pairs I'd try:
| Subject | Opening |
|---|---|
| commission questions | If your reps have to ask what they'll make on a deal, we built a way for them to check it themselves. |
| payroll changes | If you're still reconciling commission changes in a spreadsheet before payroll, this might be useful. |
| LinkedIn pipeline | Are your LinkedIn campaigns bringing in companies your sales team wants to talk to? |
I'd send the rep question to sales and the payroll question to finance. They don't need the same opening just because they're buying the same software.
I'd also be careful about deciding that personalization improved anything just because it got responses. In the original analysis, a personalized subject-line version got 30 positive responses and zero meetings. It would've looked better if we'd stopped counting before the meeting.
A relevant detail about someone's business can be useful. Their name in the subject doesn't tell me whether they'll want the offer, though. I'd keep both versions in the test long enough to see what people actually do.