Are you having trouble retaining engaged subscribers? Are you struggling to get subscribers to open your emails?

Perhaps you thought that since they subscribed to your emails it would be effortless to maintain a high open rate. It probably seemed hard enough to get those subscribers, but now starts the challenge of creating emails that subscribers want to open. Keep these three Serendipity Tips in mind to increase your email open rate, clean up your data and avoid spam complaints.

Subject Line
We all receive a ton of emails, and as a result many simply scan the subject line before deleting. However, there are some things that can be done to lower that risk and increase your open rate.

• Keep your subject lines short and to the point. Serendipity recommends keeping it to 21-40 characters or 4-6 words.
• Include actionable words or hint at the value the email is providing, and cut the filler words that take up space.
• Avoid using all caps because it reads as yelling, stray away from excessive punctuation and emojis.
• Determine whether you use title case or sentence case in your subject lines. Title case conveys authority and appears formal. Sentence case conveys a conversation and it is argued that it seems friendlier, approachable, and easier to read.

Dirty Data
It’s important to keep lists clean and up-to-date, whether they are in-house generated, purchased, or organic. This can be done one of two ways.

• The first is checking to ensure contacts are within target audiences. You’re wasting your time if the email is leading to someone who is not interested in your product. This dirty data can damage your email sender reputation and can put you at risk with email service providers, who could blacklist your company.
• The second option is structuring a re-engagement campaign. To do this, isolate the unengaged emails — these are the ones that haven’t opened an email from you in the last three months. Next, structure a series of three emails to go out to the members of this list, encouraging them to engage, while mentioning that if they failed to do so you will remove them from your mailing list. While your list may lose subscribers, you will see a significant rise in unique open rates.

Spam Complaints
Another factor that could be negatively affecting your open rate is spam complaints. These are reports made by email recipients against emails they don’t want in their inbox. Email recipients click spam for various reasons, but common ones include being unable to find an unsubscribe link or they may not know who you are or why you’re emailing them. For preventing complaints, Serendipity recommends keeping a permission-based list instead of buying a subscriber list. Letting your subscribers know how often they’ll be receiving an email from you can also help, but don’t overwhelm them with too many emails or don’t let them forget you by sending too few  — there’s a delicate balance!