As a real estate agent, if you’re not already, you should be using email to keep in touch with your contacts and prospects. The biggest challenge with sending emails is getting people to actually look at them. With the amount of email everyone receives every day, you need to do everything you can to make your subject line so interesting that people can’t help but open the email to learn more. These tips about writing email subject lines will help you improve your open rate.
Make Sure Your Real Estate CRM has Email Capability
If your CRM doesn’t let you automatically send out emails, you need to get different CRM software for real estate! Once you have organized your contacts and prospects in a CRM, you shouldn’t need to use any other software to send emails. It’s a waste of your time and makes it less likely that you’ll create email campaigns.
Email Subject Line Tips
There’s a lot written about email subject lines, but here are a few of the more helpful tips. These tips stand on their own, you shouldn’t try to combine them unless it makes sense to increase your email open rate.
Personalize Email Subject Lines
People are always more curious about emails that seem to be directed at them personally. There are several ways to personalize your email subject line:
- Use their first name in the subject line, which should increase your open rate – your real estate CRM should be able to do that for you.
- Use the words You or Your in the subject line.
- Use local geography terms, such as “News from the Highland neighborhood.”
- Segment your contact list to send emails based on interest, for example “New homes in the $500-600,000 Range.”
Start with Action Verbs
In a way, an email subject line is like a call to action. You want the reader to do something – to open the email. So, improve your email open rate by starting with an action word. It’s like a call to action — if you don’t ask, it will never happen. For example:
- Don’t: “Local Home Search Tool”
- Do: “Supercharge Your Home Search!”
Ask a Question
People are programmed to want answers to questions. When your email subject line is a question, people will likely want to know the answer.
- Don’t: “Easy Ways to Save for a Down Payment.”
- Do: “How Can You Save for a Down Payment?”
Write a List
Lists are always good ways to grab people’s attention.
- Don’t: “Easy Ways to Stay Organized”
- Do: “7 Tips You Can Use to Stay Organized”
Use Controversial or Shocking Teasers
You don’t want to offend anyone, but think about something that’s controversial enough to attract attention without shocking anyone too much!
- Don’t: “The Importance of Choosing the Right List Price”
- Do: “Why Your Home Won’t Sell”
Use Funny Subject Lines
If you can put some humor into your subject line, it will stand out among all the serious emails your contacts receive.
- Don’t: “Here are the Latest Homes with Pools on the Market”
- Do: “Did You Know Your Kids Dream of Swimming Pools?”
Follow Best Practices
Here are some critical email guidelines:
- Email subject lines should be short – think around 50 characters long.
- Don’t use all caps because it will look like you’re shouting.
- Don’t send too many emails, or people will begin to tune you out. Make sure your recipients look forward to seeing what you have to say.
- Make sure your emails look just as good on a mobile device as they do on a desktop.
- Send your emails when consumers are most likely to open them. According to an infographic published on Entrepreneur.com, that’s midnight on Saturday.
Try some of these ideas, and see if you can improve your email open rate!