Does size matter? Or, the battle of email subject line extremes.

It’s a topic we’ve debated about in the @stackemarketer crew and something we’ve discussed with readers too. Why do we have (had) those overly long subject lines? Surely it’s bad, right?

Not so fast…

We had a 45% open rate on average with subject lines that hit the limit of characters allowed for many clients.

We’ve had people reach out asking what gives, they surely cannot have a good open rate, right?

They did. And would still do.

They have a few clear pros compared to short subject lines, at least in our case:

1. We could present 3 topics that would appeal to different segments of our daily readers (Facebook, ecomm, Google, affiliates, SEO, etc.)

2. They showed more details of what people can find inside. Less teasing, more info.

3. We had a step by step process to come up with them that we could repeat daily.

4. They offered consistency both in open rates and in the creative process.

One piece from AWeber suggests that you should go short or long: https://blog.aweber.com/email-marketing/how-long-should-my-email-subject-line-be.htm

So while we got some questions raised and also got criticised about the long subject lines, they worked.

Even so, we’ve been testing short subject lines for most of this month. We wanted to see what difference this makes.

Short subject lines have other pros compared to long ones:

1. They are usually faster to come up with.

2. They generally cause fewer deliverability issues. Long subject lines can be packed with “marketing language” especially when coming from a newsletter for marketers.

3. Short ones are perceived as more elegant, more creative and they look better in just about all inboxes.

While looks aren’t everything, the way people perceive things matters in the long term.

4. Not exactly a pro but, open rates showed no difference in the end. This would probably not be the case for all content.

This thread by @TheKendallBaker explains better why daily newsletters can get away with all sorts of subject lines: https://twitter.com/TheKendallBaker/status/1263101717455032320

With all this in mind, we decided we should switch to short subject lines. Unsurprisingly though, this didn’t please everyone either.

Short subject lines can often be perceived as teasing and clickbait. We had one complaint about how the subject line was “not about what’s in the newsletter”

Of course, the newsletter was related to the subject line but it was not as obvious when just skimming...

Two lessons in the end:

1. You can please some people, some of the time but you can never please everyone, all the time. It’s cliche but it’s true and that’s OK.

2.1 You have to put the data into perspective. The open rate is part of the story but there are more questions that we couldn’t answer just from the open rate.

While we have a good open rate, do fewer people share the newsletter because of the subject lines?

2.2 Is it a turn off to share it? Do more people unsubscribe because of it?

Does the subject line match the inside of the newsletter, do we attract the type of readers we are writing for?

Whatever you are using email for, subject lines are an important but tricky topic that you have to test thoroughly and assess from all angles, not just open rate.

And don't go with any common advice for length.