I was on a call last night with Ryan Saplan from Warrior Media.
He’s made hundreds of millions writing emails for clients.
Here’s what he told me…
- Track EVERYTHING. The only way to make smart decisions is to have accurate data, rather than based on feels.
- Don’t just hire copywriters to write one email. Hire them to write 10, and then choose the best two emails to send.
- Think of the subject line as being like the first sentence of your email. So front load it with your biggest claim that will encourage people to read the email.
- Scan a page’s headline and subheads to find the biggest claims to use in the subject line
- Sexual innudendo works great in subject lines e.g. “red hot”.
- Test subject lines that sound like the email is from a friend
- The more uncomfortable a subject line makes you the more you should run it. Be aggressive and push when jotting down ideas, because you can always pull back later.
- Spend 80% of your time on the subject line and first line, and 20% on the body copy.
- Consider writing first lines that tell an intriguing story e.g. I went from being a bad writer to a good writer after studying an online course.
- In the first line try going contrarian and tell them they’re doing something right that is supposed to be wrong
- A list management team can provide better results than the world’s best copywriters because they have the data on what works.
- Don’t be afraid to send 3 emails a day. People’s inboxes these days are like their Facebook feed. They scan for messages to open, rather than read every one.
- Long emails are worth testing, and if they work they can work gangbusters. But they’re also higher risk. So when giving affiliates emails to test, stick to short “clicker” emails
As I hope these tips reflect…
Writing emails for health, finance and other competitive niches is no walk in the park
The emails may seem simple, but writing them is not.
