For my 30+ years of selling, everyone that I sold was either a prospective client or a client. They were not customers. So many people use customer and client as interchangeable words. They are not.

All salespeople should stop thinking customer and think client. Not just think client, but ACT client.

Is spending time thinking about how you label the people who purchase your products and services simply a frivolous exercise in semantics? I don’t think so. Labels have the potential to motivate behavioral changes leading to more remarkable client experiences and thereby your success.

Traditionally, people who were paid for their advice – lawyers, accountants, advisors, agents, coaches and other professional experts use the label “client’. Quite simply they were paid to share their expertise.

Let’s look at the definition of a customer (dictionary.com):
Customer – A person who purchases goods or services from another.

Your contact is looking for someone who can spot their opportunity or issue and help them succeed. They are looking for you to be an expert. You must think of yourself as an expert, not as someone who people by from (remember the definition of a customer). In today’s world, your contact’s time is too valuable to think he needs someone to buy from. Be an expert and start by thinking what you would need to do to have your clients pay you for your advice.

Successful salespeople offer real value through the way they educate and even challenge clients’ thinking.

What do you do to help your client as an expert?

P.S. I highly recommend reading this four-part series of articles in Harvard Business Review: 1: Selling Is Not About Relationships; 2: The Worst Question a Salesperson Can Ask; 3: Why Your Salespeople are Pushovers; 4: How the Rift Between Sales & Marketing Undermines Reps.)

With that statement, “The Sales Lion”, Marcus Sheridan, roared his way into my life for the first time this week.

Anyone who superimposes his photo alongside a magnificent lion on his web site is already someone I want to meet. Marcus is a pool sales guy turned hands-on content marketing guru who obviously has mastered the art of attracting revenue by sharing his expertise.

At last look, the blog post that initially caught my eye had 55 comments! I encourage you to take the time to read Marcus’ entire post: The Incredible Relationship Between Content Marketing and Sales. The thought-provoking question posed by Marcus:

“Why do so many companies fail to integrate content marketing into their sales processes?”

My response:

1. Why do so many companies fail to integrate content marketing into their sales process? I think that the word “content marketing” has left many people feeling that content is for marketing – getting people to the website and “top of funnel” and it is not as important when the sales person gets involved. The sales person sells on building trust and does not need content to create that bond. What a missed opportunity.This is compounded by the fact that marketing and sales management is not driving how to get the content that marketing is using into the hands of sales people. I am amazed at how many companies have rich content libraries but when you ask the sales people do they use the content they say not much and they do not know how to get at it. They just grab a couple of pieces, often out of date and continue to use it over and over again. Not strategically, just so they have something to send.
2. Who is doing it well? I admire:

• Owen Blevins at Mid-Atlantic Concrete – http://maconcrete.com
• David Marinac at Standuppouches – http://standuppouches.net
• Andrew Sealy at MINDBODY – http://mindbodyonline.com

The stars are aligning right now such that content can serve as a bridge to bring sales and marketing together. In the world of content marketing, getting content into the hands of salespeople and helping them effectively use it is an easy, powerful win that will drive more sales. In our work with clients using Postwire, we see firsthand that sharing good content to educate prospects saves precious time for both buyers and sellers by shortening sales cycles–whether selling pools, concrete production equipment, food packaging pouches or expertise like “The Sale Lion”.

Expert salespeople have figured out that great content is the secret sauce for making sales. Share your expertise using Postwire. Sign up for free account at www.postwire.com.

Photo Credit: Tambako the Jaguar on Flickr

Enabling informed purchase decisions…

Owen Blevins is VP Sales & Marketing for Mid Atlantic Concrete Equipment, which sells and services concrete plants and equipment to concrete producers throughout the Mid Atlantic and Northeast U.S.

Mid Atlantic Concrete Equipment attracts customers (affectionately dubbed “Crete-heads”) by leveraging its web site with over 500 pages of information and entertaining Youtube channel, Concrete Answers TV.

By educating prospective and existing customers on all-things-concrete, Owen’s sales team provides customers a rock-solid, one-stop shop for researching solutions to customers’ needs.

Before Postwire…

Owen and his four sales reps invested 15-45 minutes following up each sales call with an email containing links to relevant educational videos, product sheets and ROI calculators.

Using Postwire…

Owen’s sales team can now:

• in just a few minutes–immediately get the specific info the customer needs to them on a private page that they can easily find and reference.
• be ultra-responsive to a customer’s needs by knowing when he or she views or comments on the content shared, thanks to Postwire’s notifications.
• help the customer make decisions by adding more information and resources to the same page throughout the life of the customer relationship. (No more hunting through email threads to find web links or file attachments!)

The results?

• More sales in less time.
• Postwire shaves an hour off client follow-ups for each sales rep each day.
• One place for organizing personalized, relevant information and building each customer relationship over time.

Hear more from Owen…

So how will YOU use Postwire?

We’re eager to learn! Get a free account at www.postwire.com.

This guest post is written by Andy Paul, a leading authority on sales for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) and the Founder of Zero-Time Selling. Andy is also the author of the award-winning book, Zero-Time Selling: 10 Essential Steps to Accelerate Every Company’s Sales.  Zero-Time Selling was selected as one of the Top 3 Sales & Marketing books of 2011. Andy was our featured guest in a webinar on Thursday February 9 @1PM EST. You can view a recording of the webinar here. Take it away, Andy…

There is a lot of talk about content in marketing and sales these days. A company no longer has just brochures, datasheets or a company website; it has a pool of content about the products and services it markets. The company makes strategic and tactical decisions about how to most effectively communicate that content to potential customers, whether by blog, tweet, email, brochure, slide deck, webinar, datasheet, phone call or other means.

What does “content” mean for your customer?

When asked to define “content”, salespeople tend to have a very parochial point of view, believing that content is solely the information developed by their company, about their own products and services, that they can supply to their prospects.

Unfortunately that narrow perspective creates a mismatch with the information needs of their prospects. The problem for a sales person is that their potential customers have a much broader definition of and requirement for content. To the prospect and customer “content” is the sum total of the data and information they need to make a fully informed purchase decision in the least time possible.

In their buying cycle, prospects are looking to gather not only the specifics about particular products and services but also information and data that will help create the overall context for the decision they have to make. For instance, an informed buyer may need to know where technology is evolving in your product segment, not only for you but also your competition. They may need to know what their competitors have done or are doing with similar products. They may need to have an understanding of what products will be coming to market in the near future that could impact their competitive position if adopted by a competitor first.

Think Globally, Act Locally

In the early days of the environmental movement, grassroots activists encouraged their followers to ‘Think Globally, Act Locally.’ In other words, you needed to consider the implications for the global welfare of the earth in the actions you took locally in your day-to-day life.

Similarly, salespeople need to think more globally about the content they provide to prospects and the positive impact it can have on their local decision-making. It is no longer enough for your sales team to be a conduit for proprietary content only.

A salesperson can create real value for the customer by taking a broader view of the customer’s need for information and identifying and providing the 3rd party content that assists the customer to make a more informed purchase decision in less time.

3 Easy Steps to Becoming an Effective Content Provider

1. The salesperson needs to thoroughly map out the entire set of information the customer will need to A) make an informed purchase decision and B) make the decision to purchase your product. A and B are not the same data. Unless a salesperson is new to the company they should have the customer and product knowledge to complete this on their own.
2. The salesperson defines a list of the 3^rd party content they could provide that would create value for the customer. The goal is to make the customer smarter, in a global sense, about their problem, their requirements and the value of the solution that you can provide. Yes, the customers could go online and find this information for themself. But, envision the credibility and trust you will build with the customer if you proactively provide it.
3. The salesperson goes online and finds the information they need. Here are a few quick ideas about finding relevant content that would be valued by your prospect:
   • Set up Google Alerts for keywords associated with the prospect’s industry as well as for your products/services. Check these daily for content that will provide value to the prospect.
   • Subscribe to key blogs in the prospect’s market space. Provide links to postings from bloggers in their industry that discuss the problems solved and benefits received from solutions like yours.
   • Find 3^rd party industry or academic research on your product category. Even if all you can find online is the abstract from a research report, you can usually learn enough information from that to understand what its conclusions are. If you were working on a big enough deal then perhaps it would be worth buying the report for the customer.
   • Search YouTube (www.youtube.com ) for videos that address the installation or implementation concerns the prospect might have for a solution like yours.
   • Check resources like SlideShare (www.slideshare.com ) for presentations that address areas of interest to the prospect.
   • Search online for industry conferences in their space and look for interesting presentations that are relevant to the prospect’s buying cycle. Find a link to the conference proceedings. If not, email the presenters and ask for a copy of his or her slides.
   • Use a tool like Postwire to provide the 3^rd party content to the customer in Zero-Time. Track which content the prospect looked at so that you can focus your follow-ups on the topics that matter most to the prospect.

Being an effective content provider requires an investment of time and thought on the part of the salesperson. This investment is usually the difference between a successful salesperson and one who is always playing catch-up with his or her quota.

Need a lift? Then please read this New York Times opinion piece:  It’s not about sales strategy—it’s about an amazing antipoverty organization called LIFT.  (With lessons for every salesperson, I promise!) 

LIFT got a terrific “lift” when David Bornstein of the Opinionator column of the New York Times highlighted this tremendous nonprofit in its “Fixes” column.

“One of the most innovative organizations working to re-imagine poverty alleviation. It was founded by college students in 1998, and most of the work is still conducted by student volunteers…If the American Dream is to be resuscitated for many of nation’s poor, there is a great deal that we can learn from them.”

It’s a great read in-and-of-itself. I hope you support LIFT. Spread the word. Donate. Encourage someone to volunteer there. And, feel a tiny bit more hopeful about our world.

Also, in my view, LIFT’s philosophy has some interesting relevance to the challenges that face salespeople trying to navigate the slippery slope of prospect engagement. I by no means equate the two in terms of moral virtue. But, all of us in our work and personal lives benefit when our communication and relationship skills are honed to better empower ourselves and others.

Much is written in sales about how to empower the prospect to feel confident about making a “change”. The importance of the relationship between Salesperson and Prospect has received much attention. Frequently suggested “tips” include:

• Be supportive
• Be empathic
• Build trust
• Make it personal
• Listen
• Do not judge
• Identify goals, aspirations and fears

Here’s what columnist Bornstein had to say about LIFT’s tools of success. Notice that all of the tips listed above are strategically embedded in LIFT’s blueprint:

 LIFT’s approach is grounded in the principle that change happens through relationships.“The sheer act of two people coming together, sharing their strengths in a trusting relationship, is the most important first step in creating transformation,” explains Kirsten Lodal, LIFT’s chief executive and co-founder. “It’s the portal from which people are able to access opportunity in all its many dimensions.”

“When we start dealing with poverty,” notes Lodal, “we turn off our brains about what has worked over time for the middle and upper classes in America.” It’s not just benefits and material resources—but plans, relationships, beliefs and aspirations—the kinds of things LIFT helps its clients to think about for themselves every day.

If this sounds soft, it isn’t. LIFT has spent more than a decade systematizing what amounts to a social technology. It has developed a set of working principles for working with clients. Among them are: be humble, transparent, and friendly; focus on strengths; and beware of your own biases. The advocates all use technology (like the digital natives they are) to track every meeting, as well as clients’ progress on their goals.

The take-away for me is that helping people change—whether it’s overcoming homelessness or investing in a new technology for your business—requires what Bornstein describes as an “integrated process of human development.” In other words: “a sale is more than just a sale.” For change to happen, people need:

• tools to overcome pessimistic feelings and barriers to entry;
• the drive to aspire for better things;
• cheerleaders to support them, to feel that they are not alone; and
• they need you to take the time to get close and personal with them.

What type of communication “lifts” you or your prospect to feel empowered to forge ahead?

Full Disclosure: my daughter has worked for over five years at LIFT, four years as a student volunteer while at Tufts University, and for the past year and a half as a site coordinator for LIFT in Washington, D.C.

Peggy Kriss, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist in Newton, Massachusetts and a consultant to Visibleains. Stay tuned for more psychology informed blogs by Dr. Kriss.

One of the hardest things for sales people to do when prospecting is to communicate the benefits of their solution to the right stakeholder—especially knowing they’ll likely be communicating first through a gatekeeper.

According to research conducted by The Bridge Group, Inc., on average it takes 9.3 touches to get the first meeting.   And, you need that first meeting to start the sales conversation, right?

Not necessarily.  TimeTrade didn’t.

They were able to send a single email with content so compelling it was digested and shared with 10 others before the first meeting—which, by the way, TimeTrade successfully secured within 10 days of sending the email.

Situation
TimeTrade President and CEO Gary Ambrosino craved a new way to open doors.  He was excited about the idea of including video in email to personally connect with prospects’ pain points and highlight bottom-line impacts of using TimeTrade’s online scheduling system.  In the short time it takes to view a video, Gary was confident he could present TimeTrade’s value proposition and actually use its scheduling product in the associated call to action to motivate prospects to book a first meeting at the very moment they were jazzed about the offering.

Solution
TimeTrade used VisibleGains applications and best practices to create a single communication including:

• A personal video introduction with an animated overview; and
• A set of actions the prospect could choose to do such as:
• watching a product demonstration,
• learning more from information presented on the TimeTrade website and
• booking a meeting.

Results

• One email sent to one person who shared it with 10 different people generated 14 views

• 10 Days later, TimeTrade had a booked meeting

• 90 Days later, TimeTrade had a signed deal

“With a single link, our sales rep in the prospecting process was able to reach and touch 10 people, leading to closed business.”
- Gary Ambrosino, President and CEO, TimeTrade 

Conclusion
Getting a first meeting is a key milestone in the selling process, often requiring Herculean effort and tons of guesswork by salespeople about the right time to follow-up.  The initial back and forth exchange between a sales person and prospect kicks off a salesperson’s direct involvement in the prospect’s buying process.

Salespeople open doors and earn the right to subsequent interactions when they demonstrate a persistent understanding of their prospect’s pain points.  Sending compelling content and following up when a prospect is engaged with it (thanks to the alerts sent by VisibleGains in this example when email is opened and content is read) helps salespeople get the first meeting, advance the sale and close the deal.

Are you taking full advantage of the opportunity to start sales conversations in email?

TimeTrade is the world leader in online appointment scheduling systems used by businesses to create new customers, accelerate the sales and service process and make it easy and fast to respond to customers—24/7. TimeTrade’s scheduling software solutions are built on the flexible TimeTrade Appointment Cloud SaaS platform that has the power to scale up to meet the real-time scheduling demands of the largest deployments.

The National Retail Federation annual convention is underway at the Javits Convention Center in NYC. This is the show where retailers from all walks of life come to learn about the latest and greatest in the world of retailing. I decided to take in the show to learn from the innovative, new ways retailers can engage customers. The conference theme this year is Engaging with Shoppers in a World of Fragmentation and Change.

So imagine my surprise (or maybe not) when I arrived at the Javits Center and was greeted by massive lines (multiple) for check-in. No problem, I thought. My colleague and I had our bar codes handy on our smart phones. We would just whiz through express check-in while all these other poor folks wait for a human to slowly process their registration.

After making our way past the long lines that were almost 1000 people deep, we found a representative from the National Retail Federation who told us these were the lines for express check-in (those with the bar code for scanning).

Why the long lines? She wasn’t quite sure, as the conference opened yesterday. Perhaps it was because President Clinton was speaking today? Don’t worry, she said. The lines move fast.

Not really. It took an hour for us to get to the check-in counter. Once there a check-in person, who was courteous, manually scanned our barcode, which automatically printed our badge. We were finally on our way—more than an hour since we stepped in the line.

Inside the exhibit hall, almost all of the companies offered technological solutions to help retailers do a better job engaging clients—driving more sales and maximizing profits.

So why the disconnect between the host of the event and purveyors of technology?

1. Change is hard. Here was the National Retail Federation, an organization dedicated to helping retailers grow their businesses, operating in an old model. Not much thought had been given to their “customer experience”. The innovation of bar codes wasn’t fully embraced. Why not use self check-in? So many vendors on the floor were selling Kiosk check-in solutions! And, why not use customer registration data for streamlining check-ins? Simply knowing how many registrations were processed on Day 1 could improve check-in logistics on Day 2.
2. Change requires vision. The goal of leaders is to set a vision and enable the organization to carry it out. Here was a perfect opportunity for leaders of the National Retail Federation to partner with vendors to showcase how all the technology inside the exhibition hall could be applied outside to improve the attendee experience. However, my hunch is the conference was run much as it had been the year before.

Never underestimate how hard change is for all parties. Even so, embrace change for the good of your customers, pretty please. Put yourself in your customers’ world and do whatever you can to make it better. Anytime you need reminding—just think of me in that 1000 person queue.

What “long lines” in your customers’ experiences can you eliminate by embracing change?

This blog is inspired by David Meerman Scott’s recent post where he adeptly writes about lessons learned from political stories and applies them to marketing strategy.  And learning from DMS, I  reprint his disclaimer:

“This is a marketing blog, not a political blog. I am not talking up the merits of any candidates but rather using their marketing as examples for all to learn from.” 

So with that said….

It’s the political season and everyone is talking about which presidential candidate connects best with the voter. Genuine? Trustworthy? Feels my pain? Has a viable plan to meet my needs, hopes and dreams?

Spend an hour or two reading B2B tweets about effective sales communication and you’re likely to hear the same chatter about sales “to-dos”:

• Engage in a dialogue not a monologue.
• Really Listen
• Be Curious
• Build Trust

All of these admonitions could come from a campaign manager or sales manager. Hence, the lessons from one can be easily applied to the other—Campaigner can learn from Salesperson and Salesperson from Campaigner.

The predictably intense focus on every word, facial expression, question, or answer muttered by Candidates during primary season, coupled with 24/7 polling, yields data galore on every perception, impression, and reaction of the Voter. Consequently we can all learn from politics about “closing the sale”.

Enter the satirical New Yorker piece on what a “President Romney” might sound like given his penchant for what the New York Times and Boston Globe referred to as Romney’s “guessing” game.

In December 2011, the New York Times reported:

For a candidate who is exceedingly risk-averse, Mr. Romney has developed an unlikely penchant for trying to puzzle out everything from voters’ personal relationships to their ancestral homelands.

“Sisters?” he asked. (Nope, stepmother and stepdaughter.) “Your husband?” he wondered. (No, just a friend from the neighborhood.) “Mother and daughter?” he guessed. (Cousins, actually.)

The results can be awkward. “Daughter?” he asked a woman sitting with a man and two younger girls at the diner in Tilton, N.H., on Friday morning. Her face turned a shade of red. “Wife.”

And the creative license taken from the New Yorker in response to the Times’ report:

Chancellor Merkel looked somewhat taken aback at being mistaken for Sarkozy’s aunt. When she’d regained her composure, she said to President Romney, “I know you will have much to add on the question of the debt crisis in the euro zone, Mr. President.”

President Romney looked at the German Chancellor carefully, up and down. “I’d say you’d go about one-forty, give or take five pounds,” he said. “Am I in the ballpark?”

So what can be learned from all of this? All of the candidates have positive and negative relational qualities and moments.

This same New York Times article gives Romney some positive spin:

Mr. Romney has plenty of moments when he wins positive reactions and seems to make a genuine link, undercutting his caricature as robotic. And he is hardly giving up on mastering the art of the soft sell: he personally insisted on spending more hours talking to voters this election and fewer sequestered in his Boston headquarters.

The point I want to make here is that this guessing game is not something to be taken lightly! On the positive side, candidate Romney in this spoof took on a curious stance towards his “Prospect”. And he was engaging in a dialogue not a monologue. But was he really listening? And what about trust?

What’s wrong with guessing you might be musing? The problem is that guessing can make the receiver feel embarrassed and offended. It is hard enough to pull off when there is a high level of comfort and familiarity between two individuals.

There has been a lot written in sales blogs about the importance of taking the time to build trust and about the necessity for matching the type of communication to your Prospect with the stage or level of “intimacy” of the relationship. My colleague Bill Carney recently addressed  this critical issue in a lighthearted way, focusing on email communications. Give it a read—in addition to a good laugh—you’ll learn a lot about this “matching” issue, which will help you to avoid some of Romney’s missteps.

Making the sale—in the marketplace or in politics—needs to be done in a thoughtful, callibrated step-by-step way:

• Allowing lots of opportunities to understand the concerns and hopes of your “Prospect”; and
• Listening instead of assuming and having your conversation content and style attuned to the level of intimacy you have at any given time with your Prospect.

Yes, being curious is an important quality in building the relationship BUT curiosity is not a green light for guessing. There may be a time to play the “guessing game” with your Prospect, but the price of entry to the competition must be earned.

What sales lessons have you learned from observing the 2012 Candidates?

Peggy Kriss, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist in Newton, Massachusetts and a consultant to VisibleGains. Stay tuned for more psychology informed blogs by Dr. Kriss.

This is a follow-up to my blog post, Do Not Create Resistant Donkeys! in which I introduced WEAC and STRONG sales tactics (mnemonics coined by me). WEAC tactics can turn your Prospect into a “donkey”, resistant to change, while STRONG tactics help unleash your Prospect’s inner racehorse, galloping across the sales finish line. We first introduced these concepts in a webinar we delivered.

In a series of blog posts, I explore how salespeople can employ STRONG tactics to put the Prospect in charge of change and feel empowered or strong. In my previous post, Supporting the change process through reflections, I focused on the S in STRONG sales tactics.

Next stop is T:

• S: SUPPORT the change process through reflections

• T: TRUST your Prospect’s perspective of the change balance sheet

• R: RESPECT how difficult the change process is

• O: OFFER ENCOURAGEMENT for taking action

• N: NO JUDGING—you may be surprised what you learn 

• G: GUIDE, but do not drive the process

Why?

Inside your Prospect’s brain resides a wealth of extremely important information regarding his or her perspective on change. Think of it as a balance sheet, detailing the pros/cons of the status quo AND the pro/cons of making a change. In most cases, the Prospect does not have access, at least in an organized and useful way, to all of this information.

You can help your Prospect gain access and organize the information, ultimately making your Prospect’s decision about change clearer and more doable.

BUT you will only be effective if you TRUST your Prospect’s view of that balance sheet.  It is critical that you believe—and demonstrate wholeheartedly—that your Prospect is the best source of this information.

Trusting your Prospect’s opinion will help him or her feel understood, confident and in control of the process.  Not trusting is the quickest way to have the resistant donkey dig in its heels.

How?

• Be patient. Do not try to shortcut the process by jumping in to fill in the balance sheet for your Prospect. Patience demonstrates you recognize your Prospect holds valuable information and it’s worth the wait.

• Do not just focus on the negatives of keeping with the status quo or the positives of making a change. Be curious about the pros of the status quo and the cons of change, too. This shows you appreciate the complexity of the Prospect’s personal balance sheet.

• Ask your Prospect to visualize and describe to you what it would look like if he or she made a change; this shows you respect and trust their insights regarding the change process.

Tips:

• While it is always best to have the Prospect identify the pros/cons and risk/benefits, there is certainly room for you to offer additional data for consideration.  However, assess your Prospect’s interest first. Ask:

• “Would it be helpful to hear some of the concerns other clients have had about making this change?”
• “Would it be helpful to read a case study sharing how another client managed the change process?”

• One way to help your Prospect process information on the pros and cons of the status quo is to encourage data collection.  For example, if the discussion is around poor cell phone coverage have the Prospect keep track of the number of dropped calls.  Quantifying a problem defines it in concrete terms so that solving it feels more actionable, less subjective and overwhelming. A good rule of thumb: if the Prospect is having trouble identifying a metric, then the problem or goal is not specific enough.

Listen to yourself: Are you communicating TRUST in your Prospect’s perspective of the “change” balance sheet? 

Peggy Kriss, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist in Newton, Massachusetts and a consultant to VisibleGains. Stay tuned for more psychology informed blogs by Dr. Kriss.

Knock, knock.
Who’s there?
Santa.
Santa who?
Santa email but you never opened it.

Does your email stand out in your prospect’s Inbox with a clear, attention-grabbing subject line?  If not, your killer email won’t ever be opened, never mind read. Your prospects are crazy-busy, says sales expert Jill Konrath. They’ll likely spend 2.7 seconds—tops—evaluating your email. Make sure your subject line instantly conveys the value of your message to the reader.

Creating email subject lines can be intimidating. However, it need not be if you follow four guiding principles.

Guiding Principle #1: Start your conversation in the subject line.

Treat your email subject line more like a conversation starter than an article headline. Ask yourself, what is the first sentence I would say to this person if I were meeting him or her in person?

If this is the first time you sent email to the prospect, identify who you are in the subject line by stating your connection upfront. If you’re connecting through a mutual contact, be sure to state the person’s name in the subject line.

Examples:

• Subject: Saw this blog post and thought of you
• Subject: Enjoyed meeting you at Sales 2.0
• Subject: Bumped into Sue Johnson…

Guiding Principle #2: Be personal.

Subject lines are instantly more personal simply by keeping the tone casual and including the pronoun “you”. Be conversational—don’t capitalize each word like you might for the title of a paper.

Examples:

• Subject: You asked an interesting question
• Subject: Your ears should be ringing

Guiding Principle #3: Offer something of value.

Sharing timely, relevant information helps prospects want to engage with you. If a web site visitor converts after downloading a white paper, for example, seize the opportunity to offer your insights into the business issues likely inspiring the prospect to download the white paper in the first place.

Note: People generally do value “free” and you can use the word in subject lines without triggering spam filters as long as it’s not capitalized, the first word or used in conjunction with an exclamation point.

Examples:

• Subject: Here’s my aha after reading the GIS report
• Subject: Determine your co’s readiness using free assessment

Guiding Principle #4: Make the reader curious to learn more.

Clever subject lines pique interest and so does compelling content. Ideally, your email is comprised of both. However, rather than getting stuck striving to be oh-so clever in the 50-60 characters of most subject lines, focus your efforts on being relevant. Appeal to your prospect’s natural curiosity about content:

• they’ve expressed interest in
• aligned with their business objectives
• linked to a current frustration or common industry challenge
• educating them to work smarter and faster (How-to’s)
• keeping them current with trending topics
• providing perspective for reflection

Examples:

• Subject: What your peers are saying about the GIS report
• Subject: New benchmarking data to plan 2012
• Subject: How to turn social media into sales
• Subject: Your competition is in the news
• Subject: Metrics to optimize your supply chain

Writing email subject lines that open doors requires doing the homework a good salesperson must always do to earn the first meeting. Your email subject lines will open doors when you convey to the reader you know their personal interests; understand their pain points, tune into their specific business priorities; want them to succeed; are in-the-know; and offer a balanced viewpoint.

Bottom line: Pay attention to the subject lines of emails your prospects open and those they don’t. Experiment over time and you’ll improve your “door-opening” and email-opening rate.

Ever wonder why your email wasn’t opened? Take a second look at the subject line.

P. S. Email subject lines must pass through your crazy-busy prospect’s relevance-for-me filter AND also through software filters—or they won’t even land in your prospect’s Inbox. It’s worth the extra minute or two it takes to test your subject lines using free analyzers available on the web that check for clarity, wordiness and likelihood of triggering spam filters. Testing programs aren’t perfect; use their feedback to make quick tweaks. For example, we choose to override suggestions to omit personal pronouns like “you” in subject lines because using “you” feels…well, personal.

Here’s one free testing program you can try: Free Lyris ContentChecker for Email