Conducting business today without emails is unimaginable. Almost every day, you would be sending emails to inform and influence your clients. However, your client may be receiving hundreds of emails and half of them remain unopened. Therefore, the challenge for most of the advisors is to capture and maintain their client’s attention in the emails.
When you send an email to your clients, you want them to be fully engaged in the content as well as read and understand your message. So, here are a few steps which you can follow to make your email visible in a clutter of emails:
- Work on your headline: Your subject line should always be catchy. Keep it short. When writing your ‘headline’, be clear about the topic of your email and title it like a newspaper headline. Just as newspapers do not give it all away in the first line, use your subject line to entice the client to read the mail.
- Keep it short and simple: Nobody likes reading a lengthy email. It should be to the point. It’s a good rule of thumb to never make an email longer than 5-10 sentences. If there is additional information, consider attaching a supporting document (which they have the option of downloading & responding to later). Do not add too many images as your email might land in spam folder.
- Make it readable: Never use a long word when a short one will do. Short paragraphs and small words are crucial rules to follow while writing an email. The simpler the words, the easier it is to read. For example, check out the format of this article – almost none of the paragraphs have more than 4 or 5 short sentences.
- Use Sub-headings and line breaks frequently. This enables your clients to scan the content of the mail quickly.
- Have a focus: Ask yourself, “What is the one thing I need the reader to get through this email? Don’t send the email unless you can answer that question. One of the reasons emails are long winded is because we ramble.
- Edit: Make sure your email is error free. Double check for any spelling or grammatical errors in your email. Remove unnecessary words and phrases. Ask yourself if your client will really understand what you are trying to say.
- Proper signature: Your email should have a proper signature. Try to avoid images and keep it simple. Your clients obviously doesn’t want to know your fax no, company slogan etc. So just don’t put information for the sake of putting it as your signature is not your business card.
