How to create great subject lines for your email marketing

You may be thinking: I already have ChatGPT for creating good subject lines, so why should I consult another guide on the subject?

Two things: in order to use ChatGPT properly, you must know what commands to give it. For that, this guide presents you with eight handy options. Second, ChatGPT can be used on many fronts for your email marketing, not just for creating subject lines.

But before you get busy working on subject lines and artificial intelligence, it’s helpful to know that well-scoring subject lines and snippets, for example, are generally short and to the point. What this looks like and the types of subject lines you can create this way are explained in this whitepaper. That way, you’ll know exactly what information you need to give ChatGPT to develop good and helpful prompts.

Subject lines: Eight ideas

Need inspiration for subject lines? We give you 40 examples of subject lines using eight headings.

Once you’ve absorbed everything in this guide, craft your own subject lines and run them through our analyser tool. You’ll get a score out of 100, and pointers of what to add or remove.

1: The colon

• China: Visit the land of pandas
• Now on sale: trips to China
• An amazing adventure: a journey through China
• Travel inexpensively now to the land of pandas
• Embark on an adventure in beautiful China

Before the colon, you often see three options: a name, a subject or a time. After the colon usually comes a question or a brief explanation.

Simple snippets

For example: Subject line – “Now on sale: travel to China”
Snippet – “When are you going away?”

2: The imperative

• Make your honeymoon a celebration
• Visit Newcastle’s hotspots
• Watch Apple Watch in action
• Discover the magnum opus of Charles Dickens
• Don’t let car trouble spoil your vacation

3: The adjective

• Last chance to register
• Your most creative work ever
• Especially for you, 50% discount
• Our extra thick summer issue
• New housing offer in Birmingham

4: The question

• Is your newsletter earning enough Opens?
• Want to see your contact base grow this year?
• How do you respond to the new privacy legislation?
• Are we living in the post-agile marketing era?
• What do you think of this house?

Answer the question in the snippet

Subject: Do you also want to go to China cheaply?
Snippet: View our offers quickly

Subject: Is your newsletter getting enough Opens?
Snippet: No? Then read our tips!

5: The announcement

• Too many pesticides on ‘superfoods’
• Summer toppers are all summer extra cheap!
• Announcing our Care Manager of the Year
• Watch live TV anywhere, at home and on the go
• Dynamic Google Maps in your email

6. The short main clause

• UMC Utrecht launches real-time patient portal
• Agriculture committee EP divided over dairy report
• Facebook unleashes adtech war with Google
• The Email Benchmark is out!
• Agile organising in practice

Symbols in subject lines

Still, this remains a fun way to shape subject lines. If you dare, use a symbol.

Examples:

• ★★★Everything in the house for a perfect Christmas★★★
• ✹☼ Summer choice discount at Aldi ☼✹
• 🍸 Fancy a weekend tipple? Get inspired by the Cocktail Maker

Test all symbols across clients – some may not render correctly and leave the subject line blank. Use GetEmoji to find symbols and copy-paste them.

Do’s & don’ts of subject lines

Do’s

• Monitor competitors’ newsletters
• Use email content as a fallback subject
• Test regularly with your email tool

Don’ts

• Avoid vague titles like “Newsletter September 2024”
• Don’t make subject lines too long
• No ALL CAPS
• Don’t repeat the sender name
• Never mislead with false promises

Snippets and topics

A snippet is the first text an email client displays after the subject line. It enhances or complements the subject line and helps improve open rates.

Examples of Good Snippets

• Subject: Welcome home. How was your vacation?
  Snippet: Win a travel voucher worth £450 with your vacation review.
• Subject: Reminder birthday gift
  Snippet: Photo album gift for you as an Online.co.uk customer!

Tips for good snippets

• Avoid repeating the subject line
• Don’t use “Click here for the online version”
• Use personalisation
• Test your snippets too

Testing of subject lines

A/B testing helps you understand what resonates with your audience: many struggle with creating two distinct, meaningful subject lines. Use motivators for ideas.

Basic Motivator 1: Anxiety

• Don’t leave your next of kin with unexpected costs
• Netflix: It’s not too late to give Netflix as a gift!
• FBTO: Last chance! Switch now to cheaper health insurance
• EVO: Check VAT rules, avoid a sky-high fine

Basic Motivator 2: Greed

• Speurders.co.uk: We too scatter gifts!
• Ziggo: A top movie gift every night for a week
• BCC: Starting today, 10% off all washing machines!

Basic Motivator 3: Status

• Kluwer Training: A successful career? Surely everyone wants that!
• Tommy Hilfiger: Hip into spring! All must-haves for you

Basic Motivator 4: Development

• Kenteq: If you’re a techie, you’ll never stop learning, right?
• NEN Courses: Learn to apply NEN 1010 effectively

Example Variants (Renault ZOE)

• Fear: Be quick: 12% additional tax rate now
• Greed: Affordable business electric driving
• Status: Already 500 self-employed people have chosen the electric Renault ZOE
• Development: Get to know ZOE and learn more about eco-friendly driving

Write better subject lines

Whether you’ve already tried some of these ideas or are new to every single one, we hope you’ve been inspired to test something new in your next email subject line!