Category: Communication Skills

Article Contributed by Nicole Stansley

Your headline to email subject will determine the fate of the message recipient, potential business partner or clients will decide whether to open your email depending on your email headline. Although it is a very small part of your email, the headlines must be powerful enough to lure your end receiver to read your message.

Your email headline is the first impression of you, your business and what you stand for – it needs to be non-crappy. If you are reaching out to someone through email for business purposes, your email headlines must be strong enough to get their attention.

Having crappy headlines will only hurt your own business reputation, and have more people unsubscribing from your mailing list than you would want. It’s ultimately detrimental to the brand itself.

Here are 3 tricks you could do to make your email headline non-crappy:

1. Keep the receiver’s interest in mind

Too often email marketers take this for granted and just talk about their business; readers want to know ‘what’s in it for me?’ before they even open your email. When emails first started it was almost a feeling of exhilaration to receive emails, but now? Most people dread going to their inbox hoping it’s not another spam mail to bother them and waste their time.

For example, if your website is now going through an overhaul and you want to communicate that to your emailing list; so instead of saying ‘Our new website is coming soon!’ – Which by the way, would not interest anyone, you’ll need to say something that will be of an interest to the receiver. Say, something on the lines of how your new website will have many new offers for the reader – this will save you money, this will get you money or save time…

2. Keep your integrity

Misleading your readers or making them open the email under false premises is one of the worst things you could do. Don’t irk your audience by saying something in your email headline and leading them to a totally different message.

For example, again, if your website will be under construction, don’t mislead the reader by claiming your website is shutting down! Adding FWD or RE: before your headline is also misleading. If you really want to, you can always use ‘urgency’ as a trick to make your headlines stand out – offer today only or giveaway; just 24hours are great ways to entice our reader into reading your mails. But, misleading them is a big No-no!

3. Let your message reflect your brand

No matter how much the pressure is to be bold, or to be clever, it is important to remember your message reflects your brand. You need to keep the sentiments and emotions of the reader in mind while you design your headline and your message.

If you do anything like being vague, unclear or have a spelling mistake, type racist or sexist propaganda, it’s going to reflect on the perception the reader has on your brand.

Before wrapping-up, here is some useful best practices for writing an email subject line:

• Always write several subject lines (and then choose the best option).
• Try A/B testing for your subject lines and find out, what works best for your audience.
• Avoid using too much CAPS.
• Avoid these words in your subject lines: final, reminder, sale, tempting, specials, help, donation, exciting, discount, unique, partner, preview.
• Put the most important words in the first part of the line.
• Keep it short – less than 50 characters (many smartphones show only 25-30, by the way).
• Don’t forget a call to action.
• Preview before sending and pay attention on what text follows the subject line.

Finally, take a look at your own mailbox. Which emals go straight to trash? Which ones you open and why? Don’t be afraid to “borrow” from great mailers and create your own on a fruitfull base.

About Author:

Nicole Stansley is a digital strategist for Write My Essay, and a content creator. Nicole is also an expert in online marketing, as well as business writing.

I was coaching a group on their presentation to their Senior Leadership Team.  It was the end of months of research, weeks of discussion and development, days of practice.  Our session began.

The first speaker stood up.  She seemed relaxed, she smiled and then began to explain the assignment, telling in great detail what they had been asked to research.  Then she spoke about how her team had researched for quite some time before they could even identify their topic. She continued by saying that once they had found their topic, they started looking for new sources for research.

This is all before she had reached slide 2 of her presentation. I was completely disengaged and struggling hard to pay attention at all.

I was exhausted and she hadn’t really started yet!

Stop, stop, please, stop.

Don’t tell everyone what they already know (describing the assignment).  Don’t tell them what they don’t care about (how tough it was for you).  Don’t bore them (please!).

You don’t get a second chance to make a first impression.  That’s fact.

And it’s true for your speaking, for your website and for your networking.

You need to engage, interest and inspire people.

You need a story.

So here’s where you start.

1. Figure out what they (the audience) want to hear.

2. Discover what they care about.

3. Know what they know.
And then

1. Ask a challenging question

OR

2. Describe a scene with an unknown element (a question to be answered, a mystery to be solved)

OR

3. Tell them something true that happened to you

OR

preferably, all of the above.

Yes, tell a story.  It’s the most engaging, interesting and inspiring you can be.

Here’s the thing though, you are probably reading this and nodding slightly.  Maybe agreeing enthusiastically or maybe you’re just scanning the text to see if there’s anything worth readying.

I challenge you to take this further.

What situation do you have in your life/profession/business right NOW that could do with a good story?

Where do you need to have impact and influence?

Who do you want to engage and inspire?

At 4.30am when I woke up with pre-performance nerves, it seemed like a good idea.

To start by telling a personal story about my son. A story I’ve told a million times. An easy story to tell. ??What unfolded was not quite what I had expected. When the moment came and I was mid-telling of this little introductory story, I felt so emotional. It was difficult to get through it.

It’s like the confrontational conversation with my boss.

I remember she called me in to her office to tell me that she was worried about my performance. My direct reports were a little too friendly and not getting all their projects finished. It was my fault, she said, I was not on the ball.

It sounds like I conversation I could handle well, but I was paralyzed by the criticism and the emotions I felt as she spoke. I wanted to run away and I felt like crying.

As I prepared for this conversation, I knew exactly what to say. When I thought about it afterwards, there were a million things I should have said.

In the moment, in both situations, the telling out of a story can be more challenging than we anticipate.

And often we don’t plan for the emotional reaction, though it is our natural response, it surprises us every time!

Here are some tips in handling that emotional story in a more empowered way:

1. Plan to feel emotional – think about what emotion the situation could and does bring up for us. Work out what that means and why the story may be a trigger for other issues. Once you’ve anticipated the emotional fall-out, it’s effect may be lessened.
2. Don’t fight it – your feelings about any situation are just that – you’re feelings, it’s okay, you don’t have to change them, you don’t have to be different. It is not a weakness, it’s actually a strength! Thank your emotional response for keeping you human and reminding you what is important in your life.
3. Use the emotion – no, I don’t mean as manipulation, I mean as a way to access what you need to do to heal the situation. Listen to the lessons that the emotional response bring and take action.
4. Don’t try to suppress or control your reaction – it’s a bad strategy to try and hold back your feelings, simply because it doesn’t work! What you try to ignore will grow and then become overwhelming. Instead, envision yourself as a space that can expand to contain the emotion. With that expansion you can express the emotion in a gentle and manageable way. If it’s held tight and contained, it will ultimately EXPLODE (and that can cause much more damage!).

You know, as the youngest child in my family, I was always teased for being so emotional. To this day my siblings laugh at how easy I cry. I’m talking ‘Little House on the Prairie’ crying and of course every movie you can imagine!

It’s only as an adult, a storyteller and a story coach that I understand the power of my emotions and my sensitivity. It’s not always an easy path to be this emotional, but it’s a rich one.

I’m writing this at Bill Baren’s The Big Shift event. Bill is an interesting fellow (check out my PW Unplugged Radio interview with him) and what I most enjoy is how he presents “old” topics with a fresh, new slant.

Yesterday he talked about the “shields” we all carry around with us. A shield is something we use to protect ourselves from taking a chance and maybe getting hurt (like we start a new business but the business fails, so if we didn’t start that business we would never experience the hurt of it failing — and we have a shield that keeps us from ever starting the biz in the first place).

Shields can be things like:

* I’m too old

* The economy is bad

* I don’t have a college degree (or the right education)

* My family isn’t supportive

* I don’t have the money

* My kids are young and I need to be with them

Or it can even be internal blocks we don’t even realize we have, like a fear of success or failure or making to much money or not valuing ourselves, etc.

So it got me thinking — what shields am I using to keep myself from writing?

While I probably have a few (I think we all have multiple shields) I think one of the big ones for me is “I don’t have the time.”

I mean, I have a busy, thriving, copywriting and marketing business. I travel a lot, am on the phone a lot, when is there time?

So, yes there’s no question I COULD make the argument I have no time.

But…

Then I look at authors such as Stephen King and Mary Higgens Clark, both of whom worked full time, had little money AND had families and STILL managed to find the time to write their first book. (Clark in particular — she was a single mom supporting 5 kids and working full time — she used to get up at 4 am to write, plus when her kids were doing homework she would write with them.)

I don’t have kids. So how is it I, with no kids, can’t find the time to write?

Maybe because it’s a shield. A comfortable shield protecting me from rejection. Because, of course, if I can’t find time to write, then I don’t have to worry about my writing getting rejected.

See how that works?

So, I’m taking a stand here that I’m no longer using the “I don’t have time” excuse to stop myself from getting my writing out there.

Now, it’s your turn. What’s YOUR shield protecting yourself from writing? Comment below and let the world see it, because it’s only by getting it OUT of you that will allow you to finally make that shift.

Over time for many sales professionals the process of first impressions and conversations start to become a subconscious effort.

Do anything enough times and it’ll happen, but the difference here is that for a sales professional the first impression is one that opens up the doors for further conversation – and then you have to deal with that too!

First Impressions

You have 15 seconds (some will debate that it’s 8 seconds) to provide the best possible first impression to your clients. How are you planning on creating the most effective and fulfilling impression?

Take a moment to consider these questions and role play the general approach you use when meeting a new client. You’ll probably be doing fine however some key aspects of the first impression many people forget to even consider.

Forget about the 15 second first impression rule and align yourself with the idea that the first impression is going to last the duration of the meeting – could be 5 minutes or it could be 30 – either way you need to be able to create and maintain that first impression throughout the meeting.

Get Fashionable

This is not to say that you have to raid Gucci for all of their finest cashmere but instead realise that scruffy looking sales people generally do incredibly poorly when it comes to first impressions and even maintaining the relationship.

Haircuts are a must; no matter how likely you are to close the deal, every first meeting needs to portrait a positive image. Sales people generally have a “uniform” when it comes to attire so it’s best to just stick with that – pinstripes should be forgotten about right now.

Read the News

It doesn’t matter what your political opinion is about current affairs just ensure you’re up to date with everything that is happening in the world. Not only does it provide an easy conversation starter it also can help create an idea of the clients though processes and most importantly it builds bridges.

Also avoid comic newspapers where they’ll discuss the mechanics behind why a baked bean looks like a religious figure.

There are plenty of news feeders out there that let you read a synopsis of the top news for the day, alternatively you could set up a Google Alerts for keywords that involve your industry or your clients.

Basic Etiquette

‘Please’ and ‘Thank You’ seems to have gone missing these days, simply by using these words you’ll start to leave an instant impression. Again simple things such as firm handshakes and removing hats indoors can be the key difference between someone that’s remembered or forgotten – another note to consider the fact that the client may not be used to this etiquette so it’ll be an instant shock when you do it.

Much like the news, books and articles/blogs can be a key ingredient for building up relationships. Not only does it show the client that you’re interested in similar pieces of writing, it also helps you become even smarter!

Interest

Looking away whilst shaking hands? Asking irrelevant questions? All signs of someone who just doesn’t give a damn – they don’t have their head in the game.

Don’t be that sales person who turns off when the client is talking, you should be giving your full undeterred attention at all times. Not only does it help you to qualify and learn about the customer it also makes the client consider you to be a good listener.

If however it’s the other way around, the client is uninterested, do yourself a favour and cut the meeting short – there’s really no need to waste time if someone is realistically never going to buy from you.

The Conversation

WHY?

You’re a sales person so you need to understand why exactly are you about to go into this meeting, why are you making this call and so on. The last thing a busy client wants to get is a “catching up” phone call that only has the purpose of you trying to maintain mindshare.

I’ll tell you how to quadruple that mindshare – add value with every contact. Turn a catch up into an educational intensive course on a new law/rule/advancement that will directly affect your client. Something like this is going to stop them in their tracks and listen.

Always, before any form on contact is made, know exactly why you’re calling, what the end goal should (ideally) be and how you’re planning on doing that. Even if the conversation goes off course you’ll have the game plan to get you back into place.

What Did You Say?

If you’re listening and doing it well you’ll never have to ask for something to be repeated, obviously if there’s a load noise you may be excused to ask again, use this as personal test whenever you’re in a meeting to determine if you’re actually listening.

I can’t promote enough the need to listen and to do it well, it has a considerable effect on how you’re perceived as a professional but also it gives you the chance to arm yourself with an incredible amount of knowledge and dig deeper to further produce a solution directly to your client’s needs.

Think First

Part of being a sales professional is to address the client’s needs and to offer viable and effective solutions – however many of us can get caught out in the later/final stages of the sales cycle just to simple close the deal.

At this point it’s vital that you don’t lose your cool and start offering brash discounts and free items without first calculating or thinking what you plan to say through.

Ultimately the point of thinking first and then answering is that you’ll be able to, again, have a meaningful conversation that digs deeper into the needs of the client and gives you the characteristics of a good listener.