5 Words You Should Include in Your Next Subject Line

…And 5 You’ll Want to “Miss”

Did you know there are programs out there to help you test your subject lines before you even send them? One of the best ones is Subject Line Gold by the Touchstone Platform, and Marketing Profs recently used it to help determine the five most effective (and ineffective) words in an email subject line.

Subject Line Gold analyzed these subject lines based on the results of 21 billion marketing emails sent by 2,500 brands spanning from sectors like B2B, Financial Services, Consumer Services, Telecom & Tech, and more.

Since 2021, Apple Mail Privacy Protection can auto-load tracking pixels through proxies, which inflates open rates.

Treat word-level open lifts as directional, and verify performance with clicks, downstream conversions, and your own A/B tests.

In conducting their survey, they determined that the five words that most increase open rates (on average) are:

1. 1. Upgrade – open rate = 65.7%
   2. Just – open rate = 64.8%
   3. Content – open rate = 59.1%
   4. Go – open rate = 55.8%
   5. Wonderful – open rate = 55.1%

The most detrimental words to your open rate are:

1. 1. Miss – open rate = -4.6%
   2. deals! – open rate = -4.4%
   3. Groovy – open rate = -4.3%
   4. conditions – open rate = -4%
   5. Friday! – open rate = -4%

So if you think your email marketing is pretty groovy and you want to tell the world, you might want to think again.

Pair your subject line with a clear preheader, inboxes surface preview text in Gmail, Outlook, and Apple Mail.

Do not repeat the subject, use the preheader to add context, benefits, or a call to view the offer.

Another insightful part of this study was the consideration of symbols for marketing emails. A lot of marketers might not even be using them, but the industry data suggests that they do have an impact—regardless of mixed consumer reactions. As it turns out, the snowman symbol is the best for subject lines, while the sun symbol is the third worst. So maybe sunshine doesn’t always beat the cold after all.

To check out more of Marketing Profs’ findings, click here for the full article.

*Disclosure: ER Marketing uses the Touchstone platform for subject line testing.