The goal of the subject line is to drive intrigue and desire. FOMO works well but usually for B2C, hence why you probably get emails headlined "Grab the 40% discount soon" from your usual ecommerce brand, however that doesn't as much with B2B.
So lets break down the core requirements of the subject line:
Lets look at some examples:
"{{Outcome}}, {{how easy to achieve}}"
If you're selling a review tool for shopify owners this would turn to. "23% bump in sales with our no code shopify review tool"
People don't care about what you have, they care about what you can do for them. This formula's job is to offer a desirable outcome and immediately shut down any large investment the user things they have to make to achieve it. It plays of the classic marketing formula "How to achieve x without doing y"
"Question about {{companyName}}"
Drives intrigue, and there's no mention about what you're offering. To the end user it sounds like you're just curious about something they do or how they do it. Nothing about what you have to offer.
The personalisation prevents this looking like it's meant to go somewhere else and targeted just for the user
The quick question can be about anything your product is currently trying to solve. If you're selling lead gen services, then the following line up can be
"Hey FirstName, <personalised icebreaker="">, we've been using <unique approach="" by="" you=""> to generate <metric based="" number=""> leads, I know your industry (you're showing your position as an expert) and this approach can boost your sales significantly. I can do a quick demo over a 5 minute call if you'd like?"</metric></unique></personalised>
"{{firstName}}, {{numeric success and outcome}}"
"Patricia, close 4X more leads and drive topline revenue with this strat"
You're driving intrigue, and this subject line won't be a hard sell, the goal is to share a value based blog that they can read. Once they read the blog, track the link clicks and send a follow up email asking if they want a demo on how you can do the same for them
{{question about a problem you're solving}}
"Are you outsourcing your sales copy"?
This works really well because, if they are doing the above then they'll feel like you've got something very specific for them to read that might be better or a gotcha they need to be aware of. Even if they're not doing that, its still a great title that drives intrigue, enough to get people to ask
{{companyName}} <w> {{ProductName}}</w>
Simple and effective, this is the most common pattern used by VCs across the market and it works really well.
{{FirstName}}, Quick question about {{Company}}'s {{Function}}
"Aaron, Quick question about SEOMarketings Outreach process"
This is an upgrade of the previous version where you're hyper targeting the exact problem you're trying to solve with your service or problem. The goal again is to drive just enough intrigue or emotional interest about what you have to offer or say
All these formulas work great and if you want to generate 1000s of more high converting formulas you can use Smartwriter's AI engine to create powerful, eye grabbing subject lines that we've seen boost over 137 sales teams open rates in the last week
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