Which Emails Work Best – Soft-Sell or Hard-Sell?
By Anna Johnson on August 27th, 2008Apparently there are loads of people who’d rather be sold than informed, if the results of a cross sector merchandiser are to be believed.
In a split-test between an information-heavy email (subject line: “Prostate Cancer: Are you at risk? Find out today”) and a promotion-heavy email (“Save 5% on your next TestCountry order”), the promotion-heavy email received 89 percent more click-throughs and five (5) times more revenue than the other email.
Now, before you rush off and abandon all those “relationship building” emails with harder hitting emails, it’s important to consider this finding as “a” finding, rather than what will necessarily work in your market with your subscribers.
Factors such as which customer segment the email is going out to (how far in the buying cycle are they?), seasonality and other factors are likely to impact such results.
What this DOES indicate is that people may well respond to hard-hitting offers over than soft-sell messages. Ya just gotta test it!
