Meet Your 7 Types of Email Subscribers
May 28th, 2008I’m sure you, like me, get a fair few emails plopping into your inbox on a daily basis from various marketers? Memberships, promotions etc.? Well, as my kids are on half-term, yet again, I managed to find a spare 10 minutes today to go through all my emails that I’ve filed away in a folder for `later on’.
It was only whilst I was going through the process of opening them all, that I realised I didn’t treat them all quite the same. Not all emails are equal, unfortunately!
Who they were from and how long I’d been on a list would determine how I read the email, or not, as the case may be. In fact, I can be quite schizophrenic when dealing with emails from lists I’m signed up to.
This lead me to thinking a little bit about how my subscribers read my emails..
I mean each one of my email subscribers will interpret my email message in their own way… what is important to me may not be important that day to one or more of my subscribers.
Of course, we all have bad days or often very limited time to spend opening and reading emails. When your email arrives at the same time your kids are having a meltdown and crying at the top of their lungs, your dog just threw up in the corner and your wife announces there’s no milk for breakfast, are YOU going to read emails from anyone besides your mother? Not likely…click and delete!
I’ve been quizzing a few of my internet marketing colleagues and combined with my own email reading habits, I’ve come up with a list of 7 types of email readers, which may give you some great ideas when emailing your own subscribers.
The Scanner - This person will actually open the email, and “read it,” if you call scanning from point to point or running their eyes quickly down your email, looking for something dramatic to stop their scanning eye, actual “reading.”
Bulleted main points, framed as insightful questions that grab their curiousity, might slow down the scanning some. This particular “reader” wants a general idea of your content and wants it quickly. When you are finished with your email, read your bulleted points to see if they tell the story of your message by themselves. If not, revise them so they do.
The Multi-Tasker - This reader will never focus on the one task right before them, like your email. Their Blackberry, or other mobile toy, is practically superglued to their hand and your email message will be sandwiched between several tasks that demand their attention all at the same time.
Curiosity is your main weapon here once again. Fiddle with your email’s subject line until it asks a riveting question. Don’t be afraid to be a little off-the-wall. You want to stop the multi-tasking and get your reader to put aside their grocery list and endless “To Do” reminders and focus and on your message. Not an easy task.
Once you get a subject line that makes the Multi-Tasker stop and think, “What?” and move on to your actual message, add bullets that maintain the curiousity you stimulated with your subject line.
If you run out of ideas, find another multi-tasker, like a two-year-old child, and ask simple questions about your subject to see which ones grab their attention. Use resources where you find them!
The Bookworm - This individual will read your message and take the time to consider what you have to say, even to the point of researching the validity of your key points. Do not fluff out your message with meaningless statements. Google is this reader’s best friend.
Adding a link or two at the bottom of your email leading to valid, additional source materials for your key points will be perceived as “added value” to this curious and insightful reader.
The Detective - This reader examines all aspects of your subject line, looking for clues that uncover the topic of your message and examines their opinion of you, the sender. If, after all that, they are interested in what they think you are going to say, they will open your email. If not…click and delete!
The way to grab The Detective’s attention is to create subject lines that inspire curiousity but do not give your entire message away before your email gets opened.
The Graphics Lover - HTML graphics and text that take advantage of the display qualities of this format will appeal to many audiences and readers used to reading sales pages with their flaming fonts, bright arrows and other attention-grabbing techniques.
Other readers, though, might not be thrilled to wade through all your “enhancements” to get to the message and will just click and delete before reading what you have to say. Some using mobile readers might not even get your email, if HTML scripts are blocked or are not a format their device will accept. Be careful of this technique.
The Examiner - This person will remind you of the tax man and their habit of saving anything that interests them for use against you later. The Examiner will not only save everything to their hard drive or in email folders so they can read it later, but they will also analyze every statement you make for blatant hype.
Do not deliver your message with the hype that reminds The Examiner of those frenetic used car salesmen that populate late-night TV, or the Internet Marketers that promise $10,000 incomes for 10 minutes work a week…click and delete!
The Computer Chair Commando - This could be your perfect subscriber… the one you want to open your emails and read them. This reader will take the time to research your content or offer by following your links and analyzing the validity of your statements. If they agree with your premise or can find something useful or interesting in your product or service, they will respond to your call to action…which is clicking the “Buy Now” button.
If you can empathise with your subscribers and their email habits, you will be better able to create messages that appeal to their mind-set when they open their emails. If you’re not sure about the composition of your list, try asking them what they like or want in the email notices you send out. Use those answers to format your future email campaigns and watch your conversion rates increase.
What type of reader are you? Go on, I dare you to fess up!!
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So to celebrate our first exciting and successful year and also to coincide with 
(not that I’ve got any insider info or anything!!)
