VOLUME 4.2
Write
Makes
Might!
Email Marketing:
Subject Line Research
Details Matter:
Comprehensive Style Guide
Gender Versioning:
Could It Be Worth Testing?
Plus
Jays Tickets, Giving Back Winners
New Willow Web Site
ouR FiRSt thRee GivinG BacK WinneRS:
haBitat FoR humanity toRonto
uJa FedeRation oF toRonto
cyStic FiBRoSiS oF canada
help your favouritecharity win
$500 of print and mail services
through our Giving Back program.
each month for the balance of 2013, we will select a deserving charitable
organization registered in canada to receive our gift of $500 worth of
print and mail services (note: postage is not included and no purchase
is necessary to qualify). help us celebrate 60 years by nominating your
favourite charity using the linked form.
Scan the QR code oR viSit:
www.willowprint.com/givingback
call uS:
905-660-1515 ext. 224
email uS:
[email protected]
subject
lines
CHARACTERCOUNT
U.K. email service provider Adestra analyzed the subject lines of thousands of broadcast email
campaigns to gain insight into what works and what doesn’t. Here is a summary of their findings.
SUBJECT LINE LENGTH
Less than 30 characters. Shorter subject
lines work best with highly focused and
carefully selected words, generating
high levels of engagement in terms
of click throughs. For one offer,
stick to fewer than 30 characters
in your email subject line.
Over 90 characters. Longer subject lines get the best open rates
when they include multiple benefits.
SUBJECT LINE CONTENT
Use a dollar sign early in your subject line to
boost performance.
The word “sale” drives the highest
open rates.
FYI
Willow offers complete
email marketing services from
design to delivery!
30–60 characters performed the
worst. Avoid subject lines between 30–60
characters. This is the “dead zone.”
SUBJECT LINE LENGTH FOR B2B
In B2B emails, longer subject lines work better
than shorter ones. Up to six word subject lines are
advised for awareness emails that don’t necessarily
have a direct need for a call to action to click. Subject lines with six to ten words drive open rates, but
not click throughs. While subject lines with more
than 10 words saw a drop in open rates, they saw a
huge increase in click throughs. Subject lines with
16 or more words delivered both opens and clicks.
B2C LENGTH SHOWS DEFINITIVE RESULTS
Short subject lines with three to five words appear
to have a negative effect on open and click through
rates. Subject lines with three or four words perform
around 40% worse than average both in open rate
and in clicks. Subject lines with over 15 words perform significantly better in B2C email marketing. A
20-word subject line is the clear performer, with
115% more opens and 85% more clicks.
Other promotional words like
“free,” “discount,” “half-price,”
and “save” don’t perform well.
Subject lines that communicate
specific value perform better.
Avoid the word “newsletter.” Instead,
use words like “alert,” “breaking,”
“news,” or “update.” These words seem to
create a stronger sense of urgency and interest.
The word “research” performs better than “report”.
The words “issue” and “latest” perform better than
“forecast” and “whitepaper.”
The words “profit,” “money” and “revenue” perform better than “ROI,” “asset,” and “industry”.
Subjects that refer to specific events performed
well across both B2B and B2C.
Personalized subject lines perform better than nonpersonalized ones. Click throughs are higher when
personalization occurs throughout the content of the
email, beyond just the greeting.
Interestingly, social networks were poor drivers of
response rates overall.
We highly recommend that you add both subject
line length and trigger words to your testing matrix,
whether you are marketing B2B or B2C. It may be
an easy way to boost performance.
3
It’s the little things
that can make
all the difference.
The things you might not notice when they’re right,
but you always notice when they aren’t. Those
things that, once you have learned the right
way, will make you cringe when
seen any other way.
4
details
matter
HYPHEN VS. DASH.
There are actually three hyphen-like characters:
The hyphen itself, the en dash and the em dash,
with specific rules when you should use each one:
Hyphen
• Used as an automatically-generated dash when a
multi-syllable word breaks at the end of a line
• Use the hyphen to link compound modifiers and other
hyphenated words (Catherine Zeta-Jones)
• Use it for telephone numbers (e.g. 800-555-1212)
• Do not put a space before or after a hyphen
En Dash
• Use as a substitute for “through” (1990–2000)
• Do not use with “from” ( I attended college
1996–2000, not from 1996–2000)
• No space before or after an en dash
Em Dash
• Use it to signify an abrupt change of meaning or
thought in a sentence (The em dash—a long dash
used to separate a thought in a sentence—is twice as
long as an en dash.)
• Do not put a space before or after an em dash
AVOID UNDERLINES.
The underline is a visual relic of the typewriter age. The
typeset equivalent is Italic.
ITS VS. IT’S
It’s a dog eating its dog food.
It’s is a contraction, a combination of the pronoun it and
either the verb is or has. Examples of contractions: He’d
and they’re. Use its, without the apostrophe, to refer to a
possessive, like hers or his. Though most possessives
(Jimmy’s, for example) use an apostrophe, its does not.
ELLIPSIS…
Use an ellipsis to replace omitted text. These dot-dotdots are subject to their own grammar rules that are
often overlooked. If words are omitted at the end of a
sentence, use an ellipsis followed by a period. If sentences are omitted between other sentences within a
quotation, use an ellipsis after the period.
STYLE GUIDE
QUOTES VS. INCH MARKS.
Typewriters didn’t differentiate between quotes and the
inch symbol, but fonts do. Unfortunately, keyboards do not
have a smart quote key. You have to know how to access
the right character. To make it easier, a number of word
processing and layout programs support smart quotes.
With smart quotes, straight quotes convert automatically
to open-close quote pairs—if you manually type text.
[BRACKETS] VS. (PARENTHESES).
Brackets are used to enclose explanatory material inserted
into a quotation by someone other than the original writer
or person being quoted [I did not know that! –Editor].
Use parentheses (the marks surrounding this) as a way to
provide an additional or alternative explanation of the subject at hand: The record low for July 9 was 60° (15°C).
Acronyms are good examples of when to use parentheses:
Canadian Anti-Spam Law (CASL).
SPELL OUT NUMBERS UNDER 11.
The rule for numbers: Spell out when they are less than
ten and use numerals for 11 and above. Always spell out
numbers when they begin a sentence (Four score and
seven years ago), except for calendar years (1776). Use
numerals for percents (5%), time (8 minutes; 3:00 pm)
and ages (the baby will be 6 months old tomorrow).
COLONS AND SEMI-COLONS.
Use semi-colons to connect two closely related sentences
and avoid run-ons. Do not capitalize the word following a
semi-colon. Rely on a colon when announcing a list or as
a way to transition to a similar point of focus. Unlike the
semi-colon, capitalize the initial letter of a word immediately following a colon: Use colons and semi-colons just
like this; don’t worry, this is the right way!
AVOID DOUBLE SPACING.
Never use double spacing to separate sentences. It is an
outdated holdover from the days of the typewriter. Double
spaces create gaps in paragraph spacing and make the
eye jump around the page. Layout and word processing
software require only one space. Use just one space after
periods, colons, exclamation points, question and quotation marks, etc. With the space bar, less is definitely more.
5
Does Your
Marketing
Suffer from Gender Bias?
free app to
genderize your list:
www.willowprint.com/gender
A slew of research suggests that, in
aggregate, men and women
react differently to colours,
images, topic matter and even
the style of copy. Should you
take these differences into
consideration when designing
direct mail and broadcast email
campaigns? Could gender-targeted
versioning improve your
campaign response rates?
SO WHAT WORKS, GENERALLY?
We surveyed the research on what works best when marketing to men vs. women, and here's the consensus:
APPROACH TO…
FEMALE
MALE
shapes, lines
rounder, softer edges
harder, more defined lines/edges
colour schemes
brighter, more complex
simpler, darker
copy, voice
casual language and tone
formal, expert, minimize abbreviations
visuals
informal photographs
images featuring motion
tap into
desire for value over time,
inclination to share information
impulsiveness, immediacy of need,
inclination to brag
make the case
tell a story, focus on value,
provide stories to share
prove it with numbers & testimonials, focus on problems
solved, provide the little details and talking points
BREAK-THROUGH OR BUNK?
It's pretty easy to test your marketing for a gender gap.
1. Evaluate Your Most Recent Results. Visit www.willowprint.com/gender and you will find our free Gender Finder
app, an easy-to-use way to determine the gender of your list if it contains a first- or full-name field.
Export the first names of the people to whom you mailed your last direct mail
or email campaign, as well as your list of people who responded. Run these lists
through the Gender Finder application. Get a sense of what the make-up of your
initial list was vs. the make-up of your responders.
2. Next time, design to appeal to either men or women. Evaluate the
results from that effort. If gender marketing doesn't work, you should get
the same approximate percentage of response from your list as you did
before you tweaked the design to appeal to a specific gender. If the
response is skewed more heavily toward the gender for which you
designed, you now know the easiest way possible to increase your
response rates: Do two versions!
Like many ideas to boost response, the value of gender marketing can
be intially gauged with a simple A/B test. Encourage your team to
rely on testing and analysis, rather than opinion, to determine what
works for you. Why settle for ‘no’ when it is so easy to know?
GET MORE FROM VARIABLE DATA
Chances are you have produced email or direct mail campaigns with
some embedded personalization. Why not use the power of variable
data personalization to do more than add a "Dear John" field to
your mailer? With variable data, you can write copy, choose
colours and images, even design offers and call-to-actions
based on gender. It's quick, easy, and quite economical
when you consider the potential benefits.
NEED SOME HELP?
If you need some help with gender marketing, personalization or variable data in general, give us a
call at 905.660.1515. We'd be happy to help
you think through your tests, creative options
and even produce your campaign.
,
Willow survey Blue Jays tickets winner
We would like to thank all who participated in
the Willow survey. The lucky winner of the pair
of Blue Jays tickets is Kelly Petit, Advertising
Production Manager for Staples.
Willow announces first three winners
of its Giving Back program
As part of our 60th Anniversary celebration,
Willow is running a contest, Giving Back,
where charities can win a donation of $500 in
print and mail services via a monthly draw.
Our first three winners: Cystic Fibrosis of
Canada, UJA Federation of Toronto and
Habitat for Humanity Toronto.
For more information or to enter or refer your
favorite charity, please visit:
www.willowprint.com/givingback
Canada Pooch, Autism Ontario win Willow's
free online marketing consultation
Willow partnered with Zuz Marketing to offer
two lucky winners a one-hour consultation on
their online marketing. Congratulations go to
our winners: Canada Pooch and Autism Ontario.
Willow launches new web site
Willow launched a new version of its web site
this month, featuring a slew of new content,
apps and other cool features:
www.willowprint.com
Woman Sitting Under the Willows, Claude Monet
7183219