Bill got right to the point. He asked, “You’re the expert at
CRM how can I put my half of the seminar attendees in their seats?”
“Back up,” I said. “Your half?”
Bill explained, “I’ve worked out a deal with a client to
host a seminar and they will put 10 people in the room and I have to provide
the other 10. I’ll present and they will host the room and the lunch. It’s a
win-win if I can get those other seats filled without having to buy the room.”
He explained, “Buying the room is a theater expression for
providing free tickets to an event to fill the room so it looks like it is a
hit.”
“So,” I asked, “Why are you buying me coffee?”
He reviewed his plan to send out e-mails to his list of connections
that had opted into his newsletter and even showed me the rough outline of his
message.
He got a blank expression when I asked him, “What is the
subject line?”
He was so wrapped up in the message that he forgot that you
have to get it opened. There are two things people look at before opening an
e-mail:
- Who it
is from - The
subject line
The more personal the message appears, the more often it is
opened and the easier it is to accomplish your objectives.
I told Bill, “If you have to put 10 people in the room the
process they are going to go through is:
- Open
the e-mail (Open rates from a Newsletter list are good, up to 50% but don’t
count on more than 20%) - Read
the offer, reject you, look for more information or register (Rejections—80%
at least. The measure here is click-throughs) - If
they look for more their options are to reject or register. (About 20%,
with luck will register).”
Bill, who is a numbers guy said, “So if I hear you
correctly, if I went out to 100 people only 20 would open the message. A best 4
would look for more information. Of those maybe 1 would register.”
“Right, “I said, “so the number you go out to is critical.
With those numbers you need to go out to 1000 to get your ten. BUT I can
increase our odds. Put their name in the subject line and you get a 15%
to 25% increase in opens.
Do the math. That gets you 40 opens, 8 click-throughs and 2
registrations per 100 e-mails sent.”
Bill said, “Thanks, with the personal touch it now seems
possible.”
Jerry Fletcher
speaks: www.NetworkingNinja.com
Learn more about his
Marketing viewpoint at:
www.JerryFletcher.com